Glass 
Book. 




GojpghtN .. 



\Ro_oJ 



COEXRI6HT DEPOSIT. 




HE RUBAIYAT 
OF OMAR 
K H A Y Y A M 

Comprising the METRICAL 
TRANS LAT IONS 



<By EDWARD FITZGERALD & E. H. 

WHINFIELD . And the Prose Version of 
JUSTIN HUNTLY MCCARTHY 



With an Appendix showing the Variations 
in the First Three Editions of FitzGerald's 
rendering . Edited, with an Introduction by 

JESSIE B. RITTENHOUSE 



* 



"BOSTON • LITTLE, BROWN, 
AND COMPANY . m^CCCC 



Copyright, 1900, ffy 
LITTLE, BROWN 
AND COMPANY 

S37T9 



j'v... CWltf Kfctt:*ED 

OCT 11 1900 

CopynpM entry 

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BtPfW COPY. 

[Jfitvterqri to 

OKDfc^ DIVISION, 






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University Press • John Wilson 
and Son • Cambridge, U.S.A. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

Page 

NTRODUCTION— Jessie B. RUtenhouse vii 

THE RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

To Omar Khayyam — Andrew Lang xxxvii 

Omar Khayyam, the Astronomer-Poet of Persia i 

Edward FitzGerald's Version 19 

Notes by Edward FitzGerald 45 

Variations in the Text of the First, Second and Third Editions 

of FitzGerald's Translation 52 

THE RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

Omar Khayyam — Justin Hardly McCarthy 69 

Justin Huntly McCarthy's Version 71 

THE QUATRAINS OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

On Reading the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam in a Kentish Rose 

Garden — mathilde 'Blind 149 

E. H. Whinfield's Version 151 

APPENDIX 

Comparative Stanzas 227 

Bibliography 233 






INTRODUCTION 

IF Dante Gabriel Rossetti, the artist-poet and mystic, 
had not been lounging one day about the book- 
stalls of Piccadilly, dipping now into the " far- 
thing " and now into the "penny box," in search of 
treasure, the " Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam" would 
doubtless have sunk still deeper under the dusty piles 
of unsalable old books and waited another decade for 
a discoverer. 

It was already wearing on to a decade since the little 
quarto pamphlet in its brown paper wrappers — " Beg- 
garly disguise as to paper and print, but magnificent 
vesture of verse " — had been issued from the press of 
Mr. Bernard Quaritch at the sum of five shillings, and, 
failing of buyers, had fallen by natural stages to the 
ignominy of the "penny box." > 

The translator had given the two hundred copies as 
a present to the publisher, a generosity not likely to be 
appreciated, in view of its results, and had retained 
fifty copies for distribution among his friends ; but as 
if, on second thought, affrighted at his own boldness, 
only three of the fifty found their way beyond the 
study shelves. 

" Cowell, to whom I sent a copy," says FitzGerald in one of his 
letters, " was naturally alarmed at it ; he being a very religious man ; 
nor have I given any other copy but to George Borrow, to whom I 
had once lent the Persian, and to old Donne, when he was down here 
the other day, to whom I was showing a passage in another book, 
which brought my old Omar up." 

vii 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

Whether or not the pamphlet that Rossetti bore 
home from Piccadilly was the first that had been 
rescued from the penny box, it was at least the first 
that had made a personal appeal to its buyer. All the 
imagination of the poet, and his circle of dream-sown 
spirits, was quickened by it, and in that brotherhood of 
artists and mystics, styled the " Pre-Raphaelites," the 
study of the " Rubaiyat " grew into a cult and Omar 
came at last into his own. 

Most enthusiastic of this band of friends, and des- 
tined to do most for the vogue of Omar, were the poet 
Swinburne, and the future Oriental scholar, Captain 
Richard Burton. To Swinburne, aglow by tempera- 
ment with the colour, passion, and imagery of the East- 
ern thought, Omar became a transfused self, so 
dominating his fancy that hie began to write in the 
Omaric metre ; and to Captain, afterward Sir Richard, 
Burton, he spoke with equal sympathy, so that in the 
"Lay of the Higher Law" we find an exceedingly 
Khayyamesque atmosphere, and the free use of 
several of Omar's best known symbols. 

That Omar should fast make his way when once 
discovered, was in the natural course of things, and in 
1868 a new edition was forthcoming, expanded from 
seventy-five to one hundred and ten quatrains, with 
the original renderings much modified, and somewhat 
weakened, perhaps, as twice-wrought things are likely 
to be. The new quatrains, however, were strong 

viii 



INTRODUCTION 



enough to compensate for the loss of fire and verve in 
the remodelled ones, and the Omaric cult developed and 
spread like an infection ; but the translator, the almost 
shy recluse, who " took as much pains to avoid fame 
as others did to seek it," remained behind his veil of 
anonymity, and it was known to very few who delighted 
in the " Rubaiyat," by whom they had been " Rendered 
into English Verse." 

In 1863 Mr. Ruskin intrusted to Mrs. Burne-Jones, 
as being the wife of a " Pre-Raphaelite," among whom 
the Persian quatrains had first been known, a letter 
addressed, " To the Translator of the Rubaiyat of 
Omar; " but it would appear that she herself was no 
more enlightened upon the matter, for after keeping 
the letter nearly ten years, she handed it to Mr. Charles 
Eliot Norton, who had written in the North American 
ReMeiv for October 1869 a critique upon the second edi- 
tion of the " Rubaiyat." If the name of the translator 
was known to Mr. Norton at that time, at least his 
"local habitation" was not, and he in turn sent the 
letter to Thomas Carlyle, who, after a full ten years' 
interval from the original date, transmitted it to Edward 
FitzGerald. 

The letter of Carlyle to FitzGerald, with the Ruskin 
and the Norton inclosures, is interesting and charac- 
teristic : 

Chelsea, 14th April, 1873. 
Dear FitzGerald, — Mr. Norton, the writer of that note, is a distin- 
guished American (co-editor for a long time of the North American 

ix 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



Review), an extremely amiable, intelligent, and worthy man, with 
whom I had some pleasant walks, dialogues, and other communica- 
tions of late months, in the course of which he brought to my knowl- 
edge, for the first time, your notable Omar Khayyam, and insisted 
on giving me a copy from the third edition, which I now possess, and 
duly prize. From him, too, by careful cross-questioning, I identified 
beyond dispute the hidden FitzGerald, the translator; and, indeed, 
found that his complete silence and unique modesty in regard to said 
meritorious and successful performance was simply a feature of my 
own Edward F. ! The translation is excellent ; the book itself a kind 
of jewel in its way. I do Norton's message without the least delay, 
as you perceive. Ruskin's message to you passes through my hands 
sealed. I am ever your affectionate 

T. CARLYLE. 

But if the discovery of FitzGerald by the public was 
an accident, no less was the discovery of Omar by 
FitzGerald himself an accident. Genius stumbles often 
upon its destined treasure when faring upon some other 
quest ; and the quest with the gentle FitzGerald was 
fellowship : 

" I amuse myself," he wrote to Frederick Tennyson in 1853, " with 
poking out some Persian, which E. Cowell would inaugurate me with ; 
I go on with it because it is a point in common with him and enables 
us to study a little together." 

His first acquaintance was with Hafiz and Sadi, such 
examples of their art as are illustrative of the Persian 
values ; but probably from hesitancy to encroach upon 
the work of his friend Cowell, who was translating 
Hafiz, as well as from over-modesty in his estimate 
of himself, he did not at first attempt so ambitious a 
flight, but addressed himself instead to Jami, whose 

x 



INTRODUCTION 



" Salaman and Absal " he transferred, without the loss 
of Oriental color, to our somewhat colorless tongue, in 
a manner that merits a reading and a comment that it 
has not received, especially in the light of its effect 
upon the subsequent rendering of the " Rubaiyat." In 
reading Jami, FitzGerald's hand was broken in to his 
art, and the essence of the art itself so infused with his 
own thought that it became no longer art, but tempera- 
ment, and spoke in the translation of Omar as if an 
original word. Jami was a Sufi, and the spirituality of 
his verse is in striking contrast to the materiality of 
Omar ; but there is a similarity of phrase, and even at 
times of spirit, that shows what a preparation for the 
rendering of the one would be the rendering of the 
other. As, for illustration, Jami says to the Divine : 

" Leave me room 
On that Divan which leaves no room for Twain ; 
Lest, like the simple Arab in the tale, 
I grow perplext, Oh God ! twixt Me and Thee : 
If / — this Spirit that inspires me, whence ? 
If Thou — then what this sensual Impotence?" 

Is this not in the mood and manner of Omar ? and 
although Jami believed in — 

" Reason that resolves the knot of either world, 
And sees beyond the Veil," 

while Omar declares — 

" There was a Veil past which I could not see," 

the essential matter is that FitzGerald brought to 
Omar a perfected touch from the skill with which he 
* xi 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

had strung the loose pearls of Jami on the thread of 
allegory. Certain sources of FitzGerald's inspiration 
have been discovered in Attar and Hafiz, but they are 
none the less to be found in Jami. 

Soon after the publication of "Salaman and Absal," 
Mr. Cowell removed to Calcutta, where he had been 
appointed Professor of History at the Presidency Col- 
lege, and in the letters that passed between the friends 
during the subsequent months of 1856, we begin to find 
a mention of Omar, who was just beginning to make 
his appeal to FitzGerald. First, of the copy of the 
Bodleian manuscript, which FitzGerald made (from the 
copy transcribed for him originally by Prof. Cowell) 
and sent with his compliments to Garcin de Tassy, the 
French student of Oriental literature, who, as soon as 
he had familiarized himself a bit with it, hastened to 
write a paper upon Omar for the Journal Asiztique, thus 
winning to France the credit of an earlier acquaintance 
with the old Persian. It must be acknowledged, how- 
ever, that he first sent a note to FitzGerald proposing 
in his paper to mention both the researches of himself 
and Prof. Cowell into the Persian literature, but again 
FitzGerald's modesty prompted him to refuse the 
mention. In a letter to Cowell he says, referring to 
de Tassy : 

" He proposes his writing an article in the Journal Asiedique on it in 
which he will • honourably mention' E. B. C. and E. F. G. I now 
write to deprecate all this, putting it on the ground (and a fair one) 

xii 



INTRODUCTION 



that we do not yet know enough of the matter ; that I do not wish E. 
B. C. to be made answerable for errors which E. F. G. (the " copist ") 
may have made ; and that E. F. G. neither merits nor desires any 
honourable mention as a Persian scholar, being none." 

After de Tassy had written his paper, in which there 
is every reason to infer that the discovery of the Bod- 
leian manuscript was his own, he writes to FitzGerald 
that he has read it before the Persian Ambassador and 
his suite, who were much pleased with his quotations. 

" So you see," he adds, " I have done the part of an 
ill subject in helping France to ingratiate herself with 
Persia when England might have had the start." 
There is something to be said, however, for his frank- 
ness, as well as for the alertness of the French ambition. 

In the meantime, Edward FitzGerald, in the ease 
and picturesqueness of his country life, was shaping 
into exquisite form the Persian quatrains, by repeating 
them aloud, to test their music and strength, on his 
solitary walks. Such pictures as these appear from 
time to time in his letters to his beloved Cowell : 

" When in Bedfordshire, I put away almost all books, except Omar 
Khayyam, which I could not help looking over in a paddock covered 
with buttercups and brushed by a delicious breeze, while a dainty 
racing filly of W. Browne's came startling up to wonder and sniff 
about me. 

" You would be sorry, too, to think that Omar breathes a sort of 
consolation to me! Poor fellow; I think of him and Oliver Basselin 
and Anacreon; lighter shadows among the shades, perhaps, over 
which Lucretius presides so grimly." 

xiii 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

In a later letter we come upon this charming pas- 
sage: 

"June over! a thing I think of with Omar-like sorrow, and the roses 
here are blowing — and going — as abundantly as even in Persia. I 
am still at Geldestone, and still looking at Omar by an open window, 
which gives over a greener landscape than yours." 

During the preceding month Professor Cowell had 
sent him a copy of the Calcutta manuscript of the 
" Rubaiyat," and this had been carefully compared 
with the Bodleian, to the end that on July 13, 1857, he 

writes : 

"By to-morrow I shall have finished my first Physiognomy of 
Omar, whom I decidedly prefer to any Persian I have yet seen, unless 
perhaps Salaman." 

Of this "first Physiognomy" he says in the subse- 
quent year, when it had been retouched for publication: 

" My translation will interest you from its form, and also in many 
respects in its detail, very unliteral as it is. Many quatrains are 
mashed together, and something lost, I doubt, of Omar's simplicity, 
which is so much a virtue in him. But there it is, such as it is." 

FitzGerald's first disposition of the'poem was to give 
it, in January of 1858, to Parker, of Fra.se/ s Magazine — 
that is, what he termed the "less wicked" of the 
quatrains. 

" Since then," he writes to his friend, in September 
of the same year, " I have heard no more ; so, as I 
suppose, they don't care about it; and may be quite 
right." 

xiv 



INTRODUCTION 



It was evident as time went on that they did not 
"care about it," and in November he writes again: 

"As to Omar, I hear and see nothing of it in Fraser yet. . . I told 
Parker he might find it rather dangerous among his Divines ; he took 
it, however, and keeps it. I really think I shall take it back ; add some 
stanzas which I kept out for fear of being too strong ; print fifty copies 
and give away ; one to you, who won't like it neither. Yet it is most 
ingeniously tesselated into a sort of Epicurean Eclogue in a Persian 
Garden." 

In January we find him informing Cowell that he 
had recalled the poem, and was to enlarge it to " near 
as much again of such matter as he would not dare 
to put in Fraser," and print it, which resolve took 
definite shape, as we have seen, during the late winter 
of 1859. 

While FitzGerald was so careful to conceal his own 
identity, and put so low a valuation upon his own per- 
formance in letters, calling his talent the " feminine 
of genius," he was still human, and having created a 
work of art it pained him as much as another that it 
should come into the world still-born. There is a 
pathetic note in the following letter to Cowell : 

" I sent you poor old Omar, who has his kind of consolation for all 
these things. I doubt you will regret you ever introduced him to me. 
... I hardly know why I print any of these things, which nobody 
buys ; and I scarce now see the few I give them to. But when one 
has done one's best, and is sure that that best is better than so many 
will take pains to do, though far from the best that might be done, 
one likes to make an end of the matter by print. I suppose very few 
people have ever taken such pains in translation as I have, though 

XV 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



certainly not to be literal. But, at all cost, a thing must live, with 
a transfusion of one's own worse life if one can't retain the original's 
better. Better a live sparrow than a stuffed eagle." 

FitzGerald, through the years in which his work was 
traversing the sliding scale to the penny box, kept hop- 
ing that his friend Cowell would edit Omar and thus 
give the old Persian his rightful place, and the letters 
of this period are full of reference to the subject. One 
extract will show his point of view : 

" I suppose you would think it a dangerous thing to edit Omar ; 
else, who so proper ? Nay, are you not the only man to do it ? And 
he certainly is worth good re-editing. I thought him from the first 
the most remarkable of the Persian poets, and you keep finding out 
in him evidences of logical fancy which I had not dreamed of. I dare 
say these logical riddles are not his best, but they are yet evidence 
of a strength of mind which our Persian friends rarely exhibit, I think. 
... I doubt I have given but a very one-sided version of Omar ; but 
what I do only comes up as a bubble to the surface and breaks ; 
whereas you, with exact scholarship, might make a lasting impres- 
sion of such an author." 

As a matter of fact Prof. Cowell had written a schol- 
arly paper upon Omar in the Calcutta, ^evtew, compiled 
from the texts of the Calcutta and Oxford manuscripts ; 
but this did nothing for the " Rubaiyat " in England, and 
it was only by biding his time through the nearly ten 
years' obscurity that FitzGerald had the gratification 
of seeing his " old Omar " come into congenial fellow- 
ship ; for it was purely for Omar's sake and not his own 
that he desired the recognition, inasmuch as the subse- 
quent editions of 1872 and 1879 came out anonymously, 

xvi 



INTRODUCTION 



as the first and second had done ; and in 1882, the year 
before his death, we find him writing to Mr. Shiitz 
Wilson, who had proposed contributing a critical paper 
upon Salaman : 

" As to the publication of my name, I believe I could well dispense 
with it, were it other and better than it is. But I have some unpleas- 
ant associations with it ; not the least of them being that it was borne, 
Christian and surname, by a man who left College just when I went 
there. 1 . . . What has become of him I know not ; but he, among 
other causes, has made me dislike my name, and made me sign my- 
self (half in fun, of course) to my friends, as I now do to you, sincerely 

yours ' (The Laird of) LITTLEGRANGE." 

Almost every incident connected with the gentle Fitz- 
Gerald is picturesque, from the coasting trips that he 
used to take with his faithful old boatman aboard his 
yacht, the " Scandal " — so named because that was the 
staple amusement of the village — to the walks and talks 
with Cowell, his " own familiar friend," along the lanes 
of Woodbridge ; and one loves to linger over these asso- 
ciations, but there is a more necessary word to be said 
in regard to the fidelity of FitzGerald's work in the light 
of more recent interpretations, both in metre and prose. 

It would be wearisome and futile to reopen the con- 
troversy that has been so well waged by eminent schol- 
ars, with H. G. Keene, Mrs. Cadell and other translators 
of the " Rubaiyat " declaring that FitzGerald had pro- 
duced a beautiful poem that is not Omar ; that there 



1 Edward Marlborough FitzGerald, of unpleasant notoriety. 

ii xvii 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

is, for instance, no "Door of Darkness" in the Per- 
sian imagery, and that many other of the most brilliant 
and daring of FitzGerald's figures have no proto- 
type in the original ; and with such scholars as Mr. 
Charles Eliot Norton and Dr. Talcott Williams taking 
the middle ground, that it is rather a poetic transfusion 
than a translation. This is perhaps the most tenable 
view, but it no longer requires a knowledge of Persian 
to form one's own opinion with at least approximate 
accuracy. As will be seen by consulting the biblio- 
graphy, there are now several English translations of 
the " Rubaiyat" that may be had in book form, as well 
as many partial renderings that have appeared in maga- 
zines, and by going to the literal prose versions of Mr. 
Justin Huntly McCarthy and Mr. Edward Heron-Allen, 
one may not only discover for himself the sources of 
his favourite FitzGerald quatrains, but he may also com- 
pare the other poetical renditions with these literal 
originals. Nothing could be more fascinating. 

He will soon discover that FitzGerald was his own 
best critic, and that when he said that he had " mashed 
together " many of the " Rubaiyat," he epitomized his 
whole method of translation — and Omar gains im- 
mensely by the process. Even wine, roses, and night- 
ingales cease to appeal when one's senses are steeped 
in 845 quatrains of them, and not the least charm of 
FitzGerald's art was its restraint, and its power to 
distil the essence of a hundred roses into one. 

xviii 



INTRODUCTION 



In reading Mr. McCarthy's translation one constantly 
comes upon passages which he recognizes as from the 
same original as certain ones of FitzGerald's, but in 
which the latter has used only part of the thought, 
discarding the rest, or embodying it in another stanza. 
For example, Mr. McCarthy thus renders a celebrated 
quatrain. 

" Since life flies, what matters it whether it be sweet or bitter ? 
Since our souls must escape through our lips, what matters it whether 
it be at Naishaptir or Babylon ? Drink, then, for after thou and I are 
dust the moon will for many days pass from her last to her first 
quarter, and from her first to her last." 

And FitzGerald, seizing the essential spirit of the 
lines, while discarding the elaboration, turns it into 
this gem : 

" Whether at Naishapur or Babylon, 
Whether the Cup with sweet or bitter run, 
The Wine of Life keeps oozing drop by drop, 
The Leaves of Life keep falling one by one." 

Comparisons need not be multiplied from Mr. McCar- 
thy's version, since one will be enabled in this volume 
to make such for himselfybut the same phase of Fitz- 
Gerald's work may be considered from the literal 
rendition of Mr. Edward Heron-Allen, which is not 
so accessible to American readers. Mr. Heron-Allen 
says that during twelve years' study both of the Cal- 
cutta and Oxford manuscripts, he has been interested 
in tracing out the originals of FitzGerald's quatrains, or 

xix 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

individual lines, and finds that there are very few lines 
in the latter's rendering that do not exist more or less 
closely in the Persian. He has further discovered that 
the inspiration of several of the stanzas that have 
puzzled the student of FitzGerald's work, came from 
the Mantik ut tair of Attar, which he had been study- 
ing just prior to his rendering of the " Rubaiyat." 
He has found in this work the originals of the quatrains 
beginning, " Oh Thou! who Man of baser Earth didst 
make," and " Heaven but the vision of fulfilled Desire," 
also the noble distich, 

" Earth could not answer, nor the Seas that mourn 
In flowing Purple, of their Lord forlorn." 

The scholarly work of Mr. Heron-Allen is full of 
new light for the lover of Omar, and while he has not 
aimed at beauty of rendering, a prose translation that 
follows the original line by line is a most valuable basis 
for comparative study. 

He has confined himself to the quatrains of the Bod- 
leian manuscript, 158 in number, and to follow these 
and select from them a line here, or a line there, possi- 
bly a couplet or an entire quatrain which one recog- 
nizes at once as a FitzGerald original, is like building 
up for oneself a beautiful mosaic. 

It is certainly true that FitzGerald largely destroyed 
the verisimilitude of his work by giving it a continuity 
that does not exist in Omar. Each quatrain in the 

xx 



INTRODUCTION 



original is a detached thought, and with no consecutive 
arrangement other than an alphabetical one ; whereas 
in FitzGerald there is a certain unity that has been 
obtained by selecting fragmentary thoughts and render- 
ing and grouping them so as to form an Oriental poem, 
rather than a handful of loose gems as in the original. 
But this arrangement renders it far more delightful to 
English readers, and when it has been discovered that 
there exists in Omar a prototype for nearly all of Fitz- 
Gerald's lines, we have no quarrel with the translator 
for transposing them to suit his own fancy. It will be 
interesting to see how close are some of FitzGerald's 
renditions to the literal, and then to examine a few 
" mosaics." 

Mr. Heron-Allen thus renders a familiar quatrain : 

" In great desire I pressed my lips to the lip of the jar, 
To inquire from it how long life might be attained ; 
It joined its lip to mine and whispered : — 
* Drink wine, for, to this world, thou returnest not.' " 

And FitzGerald says (second edition) : 

" Then to the Lip of this poor earthen Urn 
I leaned, the secret Well of Life to learn ; 
And Lip to Lip it murmur'd — ' While you live, 
Drink ! — for, once dead, you never shall return.' " 

Heron-Allen : 

" O soul ! if thou canst purify thyself from the dust of the body, 
Thou, naked spirit, canst soar in the heavens, 
The Empyrean is thy sphere, — let it be thy shame, 
That thou comest and art a dweller within the confines of earth." 

xxi 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



FitzGerald (second edition) : 

" Why, if the Soul can fling the Dust aside, 
And naked on the Air of Heaven ride, 
Is 't not a shame — is 't not a shame for him 
So long in this Clay suburb to abide ! " 

Heron-Allen : 

" I saw a potter in the bazaar yesterday, 
He was violently pounding the fresh clay, 
And that clay said to him, in mystic language, 
1 1 was once like thee — so treat me well.' " 

FitzGerald (first edition) : 

" For in the Market-place, one Dusk of Day, 
I watch'd the Potter thumping his wet Clay : 
And with its all obliterated Tongue 
It murmur'd — ' Gently, Brother, gently, pray ! * " 

Heron-Allen : 

" This vault of heaven, beneath which we stand bewildered, 
We know to be a sort of magic-lantern : 
Know thou that the sun is the lamp-flame and the universe is the 

lamp, 
We are like figures that revolve in it." 

FitzGerald (fourth edition) : 

" We are no other than a moving row 
Of Magic Shadow-shapes that come and go 
Round with the Sun-illumin'd Lantern held 
In Midnight by the Master of the Show." 

And the lovers of a " Book of Verses " will delight 
in knowing that this sentiment came straight from the 
heart of Omar. Mr. Heron-Allen thus interprets it : 

xxii 



INTRODUCTION 



" I desire a little ruby wine and a book of verses, 
Just enough to keep me alive, and half a loaf is needful ; 
And then, that I and thou should sit in a desolate place 
Is better than the kingdom of a sultan." 

How near this is, to — 

" A Book of Verses underneath the Bough, 
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread — and Thou 
Beside me singing in the Wilderness — 
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow ! " 

and yet what infinite charm it has gathered from the 
touch of FitzGerald ! 

One might go on indefinitely citing close parallels, 
many in their entirety, like these, but more inlaid piece 
by piece, as has been mentioned. As an illustration of 
this constructive process of FitzGerald's we find in 
Mr. Heron-Allen's version, quatrain 134, this partial 
prototype : 

" This heavenly vault is like a bowl, fallen upside down, 
Under which all the wise have fallen captive. 
Choose thou the manner of friendship of the goblet and the jar 
They are 1 lip to lip, and blood has fallen between them." 

And quatrain 41 reads : 

" The good and the bad that are in man's nature, 
The happiness and misery that are predestined for us — 
Do not impute them to the heavens, for in the way of wisdom 
Those heavens are a thousandfold more helpless than thou art." 



1 The italicized words, the translator explains, do not properly 
appear in the original, but are inserted by him to render the meaning 
more intelligible. 



XX111 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

FitzGerald, discarding the last two lines of the first 
quatrain, and the first two of the last, combines the 
other four in this spirited manner: 

" And that inverted Bowl they call the Sky, 
Whereunder crawling coop'd, we live and die 
Lift not your hands to It for help — for It 
As impotently moves as you or I." 

While we have gained a beautiful stanza from this 
bold transposition, it is certain in this instance that 
FitzGerald destroys the thought of Omar by such a 
combination. One more example will suffice to show 
this process of selection. 

Mr. Heron-Allen says : 

" From the beginning was written what shall be ; 
Unhaltingly the Pen writes, and is heedless of good and bad; 
On the First Day He appointed everything that must be — 
Our grief and our efforts are vain." 

This, with complementary thought selected from 
other quatrains of Omar, has been expanded by Fitz- 
Gerald into two stanzas, 71 and 73 of the fourth 
edition : 

" The Moving Finger writes ; and, having writ, 
Moves on : nor all your Piety nor Wit 
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, 
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it. 

With Earth's first Clay they did the Last Man knead, 
And there of the Last Harvest sow'd the Seed : 
And the first Morning of Creation wrote 
What the Last Dawn of Reckoning shall read." 
xxiv 



INTRODUCTION 



The more widely one studies the different versions, 
the more is he impressed with the fine discrimination of 
FitzGerald in the use of Omar's best material, and in 
the art that could so vitalize the spirit while ignoring 
so much of the substance. 

When so much is omitted, however, there is likely 
to be but a partial interpretation of the author, and it 
is obvious in comparing the translations that while 
FitzGerald has done the old Persian good service in 
blotting out many of his offences, by silence concerning 
them, — he has done him an ill service in preserving 
silence upon some of his virtues. In the translation of 
Mr. Whinfield, in this volume, and in that of our 
American scholar, John Leslie Garner, as well as in 
the rendering of Mrs. Cadell and others, Omar appears 
to a much better advantage on the spiritual side of things 
than he does in the stanzas of FitzGerald. It requires 
little discernment to see that he talked far more than he 
acted, and that his arraignment of the Deity is largely a 
bravado to conceal his misgiving and unrest. One can- 
nothold, however, to the extreme view of Mens. Nicolas 
that Omar was a Sufi, veiling Divinity under a symbol 
of Wine ; since Omar himself repudiates this assump- 
tion by his scorn of the Sufi. The keynote of the 
" Rubaiyat " is an ironical protest against the ceremo- 
nials and doctrines of Sufism. Omar's voice was free, 
satirical, often defiant; and yet he was driven onward 
through his "spangle of Existence" by a haunting 

xxv 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



desire to know the Secret, to find the "single Alif" 

that should be the clue to the Master. 

Mr. H. G. Keene, who has translated a number of the 

Rubaiyat, has this redeeming quatrain : 

" If I drink wine it is not for delight, 1 
Nor unto holiness to do despite ; 
I drink to breathe a little, free from self, 
No other cause could make me drink all night." 

And Whitely Stokes draws the veil a little further 
aside : 

" I cannot reach the Road to join with Thee ; 
I cannot bear one breath apart from Thee ; 
I dare not tell this grief to any man ; 
Ah hard ! Ah strange ! Ah longing sweet for Thee ! " 

Mr. Whinfield, as will be observed, has many quat- 
rains that show the other self of Omar, and Mr. John 
Leslie Garner has also penetrated deeply into this 
unrest. Two Rubaiyat in his rendering may be cited 
as illustrative : 

" When thee, my soul, in wine's strong chains I bind, 
Who comes to thee upon the desert wind ? 
Who is this mighty being who without 
Is none the less the God within thee shrined ? 

Oh, Allah, grant my wounded heart Thy rest ; 2 
Be merciful unto my grief-torn breast ; 
Forgive these feet that bring me to the inn ; 
Forgive this hand that takes the vine's bequest." 



i See McCarthy, C XXX; Whinfield, XXXIX. 
2 See McCarthy, CCCC XXIII. 



XXVI 



INTRODUCTION 



Often, too, in varying phrase, recurs this desire : 

" And now I fain would know if sins of mine 
Can overthrow Thy mercy at the last." 

Instead of saying with Mr. Andrew Lang, " No Man 
so sure as Omar once was sure " we should say, no one 
so unsure ; for Omar is ever groping and never finding, 
and his abandonment to the senses is always reaction- 
ary. It is after he has "eagerly frequented Doctor and 
Saint," and addressed himself to the " rolling Heaven," 
and gone in vain " down on the stubborn floor of 
Earth," — that he finally leans his lip to the "poor 
earthen Urn " that bids him — " Drink ! " He has pon- 
dered too much, and in sheer weariness at mysticism 
and cant, comes back to the old dictum : 

" Waste not your Hour, nor in the vain pursuit 
Of This and That endeavor and dispute ; 
Better be jocund with the fruitful Grape 
Than sadden after none, or bitter, Fruit." 

Omar was a hopeless fatalist, yet longing to hope ; and 
inclined, very properly, from a fatalistic standpoint, to 
lay the blame for this Sorry Scheme of Things upon 
the One who planned it. Mr. Garner has two strong 
quatrains in this mood : 

1 " I am as from Thy Crucible I came, 

A base alloy and conscious of my shame. 
Why should I strive my erring ways to mend ? 
'T is Thine, Oh, Allah, and not mine the blame ! 



i See Whinfield, LVI and C XXVIII. 

xxvii 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



li( Lives there a man who keepeth each decree ? — 
And if I err, 't is writ Thou chastenest me. 
What ! if I sin, and in return Thou strikest, 
What is the difference between me and Thee." 

Had evolution, both natural and spiritual, been demon- 
strated before Omar's time, we may believe that it 
would have unlocked the Door to which he " found no 
Key"; but without Science he could not grasp what 
was being dimly foreshadowed, and that the Creator 
should 

" From His helpless Creature be repaid 
Pure Gold for what He lent him dross-allay'd " 

was to him only insolence, instead of beneficent law. 
Taking into account this fatalism, and the retrogression 
from intellectual and spiritual to material which one 
finds in Omar, even though stirred, as has been shown, 
with a high unrest, — there is very little from a philo- 
sophical standpoint in his work for the Western world 
and the Twentieth Century. There are, however, cer- 
tain eternally modern thoughts, such as that splendid 
epitome of all philosophy, " I, myself, am Heaven and 
Hell," that will be a residuum after any analysis. 

In bringing into one volume the " Rubaiy&t " in three 
interpretations, one may get much closer to the real 
nature of the Persian. Mr. Whinfield's translation, 
having been published only in England, is compara- 



i See Whinfield, CC XXIX ; McCarthy, CCCC XXV. 

xxviii 



INTRODUCTION 



tively unfamiliar to American readers ; but from its 
acknowledged accuracy as well as art, an acquaintance 
with it will be interesting and valuable. It was the 
outgrowth of intimate study of the Persian and other 
Oriental literature, entered upon while the translator 
was in the Bengal Service and is especially valuable 
from the fact that Mr. Whinfield has not only col- 
lated the various manuscripts of Omar for the most 
authentic quatrains, but has carefully sifted from the 
mass of fugitive Rubaiyat attributed to him those that 
seem to bear strongest evidence of the master's hand. 
The quatrains are also translated in their original 
grouping, and each in its entirety, which renders the 
work much closer to the original than that of Fitz- 
Gerald. Mr. Whinfield's translation is well known in 
England, and has received there the endorsement of all 
Omaric scholars. 

In his preface he discusses at some length the duality 
of Omar's nature, and concludes that " his philosophi- 
cal studies would naturally stimulate his skeptical and 
irreligious disposition, while his mystical leanings 
would operate mainly in the contrary direction." 

" His poems," adds the translator, " were obviously not all written 
at one period of his life, but from time to time, just as circumstances 
and mood suggested, and under the influence of the thoughts, pas- 
sions, and desires which happened to be uppermost at the moment. 
It may be that the irreligious and Epicurean quatrains were written 
in youth, and the devotional only in riper years. But this hypothe- 
sis seemed to be disproved by Shahrastani's account of him, which is 
quite silent as to any such conversion or change of sentiment on his 

xxix 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



part, and also by the fact that he describes himself from first to last as 
a halter between two opinions, and as a backslider in his practice." 

The mention of Omar by Shahrastani, who was born 
in 479 A.H. and lived for some time at Naishapur, is 
interesting from its personal picture of the poet: 

" Omar al Khayyam, Imam of Khorasan, and the greatest scholar 
of his time, was versed in all the learning of the Greeks. He ware 
wont to exhort men to seek the One Author of all by purifying the 
bodily actions in order to the sanctification of the soul. He also 
used to recommend the study of Politics as laid down in Greek 
authors. The later Sufis have caught at the apparent sense of parts 
of his poems and accommodated them to their own canon, making 
them a subject of discussion in their assemblies and conventicles, 
but the esoteric sense consists in axioms of natural religion and 
principles of universal obligation. "When the men of his time an- 
athematized his doctrines, and drew forth his opinions from the 
concealment in which he had veiled them, he went in fear of his life, 
and placed some check on the sallies of his tongue and his pen. He 
made the pilgrimage, but it was from accident rather than piety, 
still betraying his unorthodox views. On his arrival at Baghdad the 
men who prosecuted the same ancient studies as he flocked to meet 
him, but he shut the door in their faces, as one who had renounced 
those studies and cultivated them no longer. On his return to his 
native city he made a practice of attending the morning and evening 
prayers and of disguising his private opinions, but for all that, they 
were no secret. In astronomy and in all philosophy he was without 
a rival, and his eminence in those sciences would have passed into a 
proverb had he only possessed self-control." 

In the fact of Omar's wide learning, his studies in 
youth with the theologian Imam Muaffik, who indoc- 
trinated him with the conception of God as the " Only- 
Real Agent," leaving no room for the determining 
power of Will ; his later familiarity with the Moslem 

XXX 



INTRODUCTION 



philosophers and the Sufi mystics, as well as in the 
skeptical effect of scientific studies upon his thought, — 
Mr. Whinfield finds the explanation of the two phases 
of his character, or rather the two habits of his mind, 
since his character is generally conceded to have been 
more reputable than some of his Bacchanalian stanzas 
would give one to infer. 

Omar has perhaps had no interpreter who brought to 
him so much enthusiasm as did Mr. Justin McCarthy ; 
he studied Persian solely that he might know Omar. 
His rendition, while in prose, is such as to stimulate 
one's poetic sense ; one catches the colour and fancy and 
sets them to his own rhythm. Whitman says, " The 
great poems are such as give you to form for yourself 
poems," and Mr. McCarthy's prose has the qualities of 
such a poem. 

In his delightful preface, still warm with first joy, he 
describes the effect which the reading of FitzGerald's 
quatrains had upon him: 

" I drank the red wine of Omar," he says, " from the enchanted 
chalice of FitzGerald and gloried, as joyously as Omar himself, in the 
intoxication. The book was not mine to keep, but I knew it almost 
by heart before I parted with it ; and I speedily had an Omar of my 
own. From this Omar with infinite pains I made a small copy which 
I carried about with me, carried with me in wanderings to Italy, and 
read and re-read ; read in all manner of fair Italian cities, till even 
now the winds of Verona and the waters of Venice and ' praeceps 
anio' seem to bear the burden rather of the dear old Persian singer 
than any echo of Romeo, or Tasso, or Horace. I made myself a kind 

xxxi 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



of little religion out of Omar ; I became a burden to my friends ; my 
writings — for I wrote even in those days — seemed with the persis- 
tency of Hotspur's starling to do little save echo the name of Omar. 

11 From the Omar of FitzGerald's incomparable verse to Omar 
himself the real Omar in his native Persian was a step, but a hard 
step. ... I struggled with the strange script of the East; I be- 
came possessed of Mr. Whinfield's edition first, then of Nicolas', 
the one accompanied by a rendering in English verse, the other 
by a translation in French prose. With these in such leisure as I 
could find, and at long intervals, I grappled. My Persian of to-day 
is at the best but beggarly, but such as it is it has given me infinite 
pleasure. I have got a little nearer to the great poet of Naishapur." 

In speaking of the recognition of Omar at nearly the 
same time in France and England, Mr. McCarthy men- 
tions that Theophile Gautier was to the translation of 
Nicolas, what Swinburne was to that of FitzGerald — 
its most enthusiastic admirer, and Omar's most ardent 
devotee. 

" Th6ophile Gautier's words," he says, " help to conjure up a 
characteristic, delightful picture of Omar Khayyam seated on some 
wide white terrace at the cool of the day with friends and dancing- 
girls about him, with cups and jars at hand, with some book of verses 
hard by, the fair fine Persian script black upon the ivory-tinted vel- 
lum all gorgeous with blues and reds and powdered with gold. Here 
the skimmer of the stars set free his soul, laughed at the mollahs, 
sang his divine songs and ' Loosed his fingers in the tresses of the 
cypress-slender minister of wine.' Or we may imagine him walking 
in some garden red with roses and noisy with nightingales, and 
meditating upon the doom of youth and beauty and the grinding 
Wheel of Heaven which reduces Jamshid and Kai Khosrou to Pot- 
ter's clay and bids tulips spring from the cheeks of perished loveli- 
ness. Or yet again reclining in some green place where the lilies 
blow like the lazy Horatian child of genius, ' By the smooth head of. 
some sacred stream,' with wine and rhymes and a delicious friend. 

xxxii 



INTRODUCTION 



But always melancholy, as melancholy as Koheleth yesterday, Scho- 
penhauer or Julius Bahnsen to-day, filled indeed with what Renan 
calls ' la grande curiosite,' but wholly unable to gratify it or stifle it." 

Such picturesque visions as these bespeak the sym- 
pathetic sight, and it is with this sympathy that Mr. 
McCarthy approaches Omar. 

In presenting these versions of the " Rubaiyat " there 
is no intention of instituting a literary comparison, but 
simply of bringing together representative translations 
from the standpoint of fidelity and beauty ; for all must 
concede that of the many gates by which one may 
enter Omar's garden, the " Gate which is called Beau- 
tiful " remains that opened by Edward FitzGerald. 

JESSIE B. RITTENHOUSE. 



XXXlll 



The Rubaiyat of 
Omar Khayyam 

The Astronomer-Poet of Persia 
Rendered into English Verse by 

Edward FitzGerald 



TO OMAR KHAYYAM 



TJfJTlSE Omar, do the Southern freezes fling 
* " cflbove your Grave, at ending of the Spring, 
"The Snowdrift of the Petals of the ^ose, 
The %ild Ifrhite ^oses you J&ere %>ont to sing ? 

Far in the South I know a Land divine, 1 
cAnd there is many a Saint and many a Shrine, 
(And over all the shrines the blossom blows 
Of ^oses that l&ere dear to you as Wine* 

You faere a Saint of unbelieving Days, 
Liking your Life and happy in Men's Praise; 
Enough for you the Shade beneath the Bough, 
Enough to %atch the foild World go its Ways. 

Dreadless and hopeless thou of Heaven or Hell, 
Careless of Words thou hadst not Skill to spell, 
Content to know not all thou knowest now, 
What's Death? Doth any <Pitcher dread the Welt? 



1 The hills above San Remo f where rose-bushes are planted by the 
shrines* Omar desired that his grave might be 'where the e wind<would 
scatter rose-leaves over it* 



XXXVll 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

The Pitchers %e, ^hose cMaker makes them ill, 
Shall He torment them if they chance to spill? 
cHjiy, like the broken Potsherds are T^e cast 
Forth and forgotten, — and %hat %>itl be %>illl 

So still %ere %e, before the cMonths began 
That rounded us and shaped us into Man* 
So still %e shall be, surely, at the last, 
Seamless, untouched of 'Blessing or of 'Ban I 

<Ah, strange it seems that this thy common Thought — 
Hovj all Things have been, ay, and shall be nought — 
Was ancient Wisdom in thine ancient East, 
In those old 'Days %>hen Sentac fight li?as fought, 

Which gave our England for a captive Land, 
To pious Chiefs of a believing 'Band, 
<A gift to the 'Believer from the 'Priest, 
Tossed from the holy to the blood-red Hand ! l 

Yea, thou %ert singing %hen that cArrovj clave 
Through Helm and Brain of him %ho could not save 
His England, even of Harold, Godwin's son ; 
The high Tide murmurs by the Hero's Grave I 



1 Omar %as contemporary faith the 'Battle of Hastings. 

xxxviii 



TO OMAR KHAYYAM 

cAnd thou %>ert %>reathing Tfyses — %ho can tell? — 
Or chanting for some Girl that pleased thee %>ell, 
Or satst at %>ine in cNjishapur, %>hen dun 
The twilight Veiled the Field %>here Harold fell! 

The salt Sea-waves above him rage and roam I 
c/llong the %hite Walls of his guarded Home ; 
SNj> Zephyr stirs the Ttyse, hut o f er the Wave 
The %ild Wind beats the breakers into Foam I 

cAnd dear to him, as Tfyses 'toere to thee, 
'Rings long the Tfyar of Onset of the Sea; 
The Swan's Path of his Fathers is his Grave: 
His Sleep, methinks, is sound as thine can be. 

His ^as the cMge of Faith, %hen all the West 
Looked to the driest for Torment or for Rest; 
c/lnd thou < \t>ert living then, and didst not heed 
The Saint %>ho banned thee or the Saint %>ho blessed! 

c/lges of 'Progress ! These eight hundred Years 
Hath Europe shuddered %ith her Hopes or Fears, 
And novo! — she listens in the Wilderness 

To thee, and half believetb %hat she hears ! 
xxxix 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

Hadst thou THE SECRET? <Ah, and %ho may tell} 
"cAn Hour %e have," thou saidst; " <Ab, %aste it welt! " 
<An Hour we have, and yet Eternity 
Looms o f er us, and the Thought of Heaven or Hell! 

cNiay, we can never he as wise as thou, 

idle Singer f neath the blossomed Bough* 

c^Cay, and vje cannot he content to die* 

We cannot shirk the Questions " Where? " and" Horn)? " 

Ah, not from learned ^eace and gay Content, 
Shall we of England go the vjay he vjent — 
The Singer of the Red Wine and the Tfyse — 
3(ay, otherwise than his our Day is spent! 

Serene he dwelt in fragrant c)^ash%pur, 
*But we must wander while the Stars endure, 
He Knew the SECRET: we have none that knows* 
oAfo Man so sure as Omar once was sure! 

cANDREW LANG* 



xl 



OMAR KHAYYAM 

The Astronomer-Poet of Persia 

OMAR KHAYYAM was born at Naishapur in 
Khorassan in the latter half of our Eleventh, 
and died within the First Quarter of our 
Twelfth Century. The slender Story of his Life is 
curiously twined about that of two other very con- 
siderable Figures in their Time and Country: one of 
whom tells the Story of all Three. This was Nizam 
ul Mulk, Vizyr to Alp Arslan the Son, and Malik Shah 
the Grandson, of Toghrul Beg the Tartar, who had 
wrested Persia from the feeble successor of Mahmud 
the Great, and founded that Seljukian Dynasty which 
finally roused Europe into the Crusades. This Nizam 
ul Mulk, in his Wasiyat — -or Testament — which he 
wrote and left as a Memorial for future Statesmen — 
relates the following, as quoted in the Calcutta Review, 
No. LIX., from Mirkhond's History of the Assassins* 
" ' One of the greatest of the wise men of Khorassan 
was the Imam Mowaffak of Naishapur, a man highly 
honoured and reverenced — may God rejoice his soul; 
his illustrious years exceeded eighty-five, and it was 
the universal belief that every boy who read the Koran 
or studied the traditions in his presence, would assur- 
edly attain to honour and happiness. For this cause 
did my father send me from Tus to Naishapur with 
Abd-us-samad, the doctor of law, that I might employ 
myself in study and learning under the guidance of 
that illustrious teacher. Towards me he ever turned 
i i 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

an eye of favour and kindness, and as his pupil I felt 
for him extreme affection and devotion, so that I 
passed four years in his service. When I first came 
there, I found two other pupils of mine own age 
newly arrived, Hakim Omar Khayyam and the ill- 
fated Ben Sabbah. Both were endowed with sharp- 
ness of wit and the highest natural powers ; and we 
three formed a close friendship together. When the 
Imam rose from his lectures, they used to join me, and 
we repeated to each other the lessons we had heard. 
Now Omar was a native of Naishapur, while Hasan 
Ben Sabbah's father was one AH, a man of austere 
life and practice, but heretical in his creed and doc- 
trine. One day Hasan said to me and to Khayyam, 
" It is a universal belief that the pupils of the Imam 
Mowaffak will attain to fortune. Now, even if we all 
do not attain thereto, without doubt one of us will ; 
what, then shall be our mutual pledge and bond?" 
We answered, " Be it what you please." — " Well," he 
said, " let us make a vow, that to whomsoever this 
fortune falls, he shall share it equally with the rest, 
and reserve no pre-eminence for himself." — " Be it so," 
we both replied, and on those terms we mutually 
pledged our words. Years rolled on, and I went from 
Khorass&n to Transoxiana, and wandered to Ghazni 
and Cabul ; and when I returned I was invested with 
office, and rose to be administrator of affairs during the 
Sultanate of Sultan Alp Arslan.' 

2 



OMAR K H AY YA M 

" He goes on to state that years passed by, and both 
his old school-friends found him out, and came and 
claimed a share in his good fortune, according to the 
school-day vow. The Vizier was generous and kept 
his word. Hasan demanded a place in the government, 
which the Sultan granted at the Vizier's request ; but, 
discontented with a gradual rise, he plunged into the 
maze of intrigue of an Oriental Court, and, failing in a 
base attempt to supplant his benefactor, he was dis- 
graced and fell. After many mishaps and wanderings, 
Hasan became the head of the Persian sect of the 
Isma.ilia.ns, — a party of fanatics who had long mur- 
mured in obscurity, but rose to an evil eminence under 
the guidance of his strong and evil will. In A.D. 1090, 
he seized the castle of Alamut, in the province of 
Rudbar, which lies in the mountainous tract south of 
the Caspian Sea, and it was from this mountain home 
he obtained that evil celebrity among the Crusaders as 
the OLD MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS, and spread 
terror through the Mohammedan world ; and it is yet 
disputed whether the word Assassin, which they have 
left in the language of modern Europe, as their dark 
memorial, is derived from the hashish, or opiate of 
hemp-leaves (the Indian bhang), with which they 
maddened themselves to the sullen pitch of Oriental 
desperation, or from the name of the founder of the 
dynasty, whom we have seen in his quiet collegiate 
days, at Naishapur. One of the countless victims of 

3 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

the Assassin's dagger was Nizam ul Mulk himself, the 
old school-boy friend. 1 

" Omar Khayyam also came to the Vizier to claim 
his share ; but not to ask for title or office. ' The 
greatest boon you can confer on me,' he said, ' is to 
let me live in a corner under the shadow of your for- 
tune, to spread wide the advantages of Science, and 
pray for your long life and prosperity.' The Vizier 
tells us that, when he found Omar was really sincere 
in his refusal, he pressed him no further, but granted 
him a yearly pension of 1200 mithkals of gold, from the 
treasury of Naishapur. 

" At Naishapur thus lived and died Omar Khayyam, 
c busied,' adds the Vizier, * in winning knowledge of 
every kind, and especially in Astronomy, wherein he 
attained to a very high pre-eminence. Under the Sul- 
tanate of Malik Shah, he came to Merv, and obtained 
great praise for his proficiency in science, and the 
Sultan showered favours upon him.' 

" When Malik Shah determined to reform the calen- 
dar, Omar was one of the eight learned men employed 
to do it ; the result was the Jalali era (so called from 



1 Some of Omar's Rubaiyat warn us of the danger of Greatness, 
the instability of Fortune, and while advocating Charity to all Men, 
recommending us to be too intimate with none. Attar makes 
Nizam ul Mulk use the very words of his friend Omar [Rub. xxviii.], 
11 When Nizam ul Mulk was in the Agony (of Death) he said, « Oh 
God ! I am passing away in the hand of the Wind.' " 

4 



OMAR K H AY YA M 

Jalal-ud-din, one of the king's names) — ' a computation 
of time,' says Gibbon, 'which surpasses the Julian, 
and approaches the accuracy of the Gregorian style.' 
He is also the author of some astronomical tables, en- 
titled Ziji-Malikshahi," and the French have lately 
republished and translated an Arabic Treatise of his 
on Algebra. 

" His Takhallus or poetical name (Khayyam) signi- 
fies a Tentmaker, and he is said to have at one time 
exercised that trade, perhaps before Nizam ul Mulk's 
generosity raised him to independence. Many Persian 
poets similarly derive their names from their occupa- 
tions ; thus we have Attar, ' a druggist,' Assar, 'an oil 
presser,' etc. 1 Omar himself alludes to his name in 
the following whimsical lines : — 

* Khayyam, who stitched the tents of science, 
Has fallen in grief's furnace and been suddenly burned ; 
The shears of Fate have cut the tent ropes of his life, 
And the broker of Hope has sold him for nothing ! ' 

" We have only one more anecdote to give of his 
Life, and that relates to the close ; it is told in the 
anonymous preface which is sometimes prefixed to his 
poems ; it has been printed in the Persian in the 
Appendix to Hyde's Veterum Persarum Religio, p. 499 ; 



1 Though all these, like our Smiths, Archers, Millers, Fletchers, 
etc., may simply retain the Surname of an hereditary calling. 

5 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

and D'Herbelot alludes to it in his Bibliotheque, under 
Khtam: — 1 

" ' It is written in the chronicles of the ancients that 
this King of the Wise, Omar Khayyam, died at 
Naishapur in the year of the Hegira, 517 (A. D. 1123) ; 
in science he was unrivalled — the very paragon of his 
age. Khwajah Nizami of Samarcand, who was one of 
his pupils, relates the following story: "I often 
used to hold conversations with my teacher, Omar 
Khayyam, in a garden ; and one day he said to me, 
' My tomb shall be in a spot where the north wind 
may scatter roses over it.' I wondered at the words 
he spake, but I knew that his were no idle words. 2 



1 " Philosophe Musulman qui a vecu en Odeur de Sainted dans 
sa Religion, vers la Fin du premier et le Commencement du second 
Siecle," no part of which, except the " Philosophe," can apply to our 
Khayyam. 

2 The Rashness of the Words, according to D'Herbelot, consisted 
in being so opposed to those in the Koran : " No Man knows where 
he shall die ! " — This story of Omar reminds me of another so natu- 
rally — and when one remembers how wide of his humble mark the 
noble sailor aimed — so pathetically told by Captain Cook — not by 
Doctor Hawkesworth — in his Second Voyage (i. 374). When leav- 
ing Ulietea, " Oreo's last request was for me to return. When he 
saw he could not obtain that promise, he asked the name of my 
Marai (burying-place). As strange a question as this was, I hesitated 
not a moment to tell him ' Stepney,' the parish in which I live when 
in London. I was made to repeat it several times over till they could 
pronounce it ; and then ' Stepney Marai no Toote ' was echoed 
through an hundred mouths at once. I afterwards found the same 
question had been put to Mr. Forster by a man on shore ; but he 

6 



OMAR K H AY YA M 

Years after, when I chanced to revisit Naishapur, I went 
to his final resting-place, and lo ! it was just outside a 
garden, and trees laden with fruit stretched their 
boughs over the garden wall, and dropped their flowers 
upon his tomb, so that the stone was hidden under 
them." ' " 

Thus far — without fear of Trespass — from the 
Calcutta Review. The writer of it, on reading in India 
this story of Omar's Grave, was reminded, he says, 
of Cicero's Account of finding Archimedes' Tomb at 
Syracuse, buried in grass and weeds. I think Thor- 
waldsen desired to have roses grow over him; a wish 
religiously fulfilled for him to the present day, I 
believe. However, to return to Omar. 

Though the Sultan "shower'd Favours upon him," 
Omar's Epicurean Audacity of Thought and Speech 
caused him to be regarded askance in his own Time 
and Country. He is said to have been especially hated 
and dreaded by the Sufis, whose Practice he ridiculed, 
and whose Faith amounts to little more than his own, 
when stript of the Mysticism and formal recognition of 
Islamism under which Omar would not hide. Their 
Poets, including Hafiz, who are (with the exception of 
Firdausi) the most considerable in Persia, borrowed 
largely, indeed, of Omar's material, but turning it to 



gave a different and indeed more proper answer, by saying, ' No man 
who used the sea could say where he should be buried.' " 

7 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

a mystical Use more convenient to Themselves and 
the People they addressed ; a People quite as quick of 
Doubt as of Belief; as keen of Bodily Sense as of In- 
tellectual ; and delighting in a cloudy composition of 
both, in which they could float luxuriously between 
Heaven and Earth, and this World and the Next, on 
the wings of a poetical expression, that might serve 
indifferently for either. Omar was too honest of 
Heart as well as of Head for this. Having failed 
(however mistakenly) of finding any Providence but 
Destiny, and any World but This, he set about making 
the most of it; preferring rather to soothe the Soul 
through the Senses into Acquiescence with Things as 
he saw them, than to perplex it with vain disquietude 
after what they might be. It has been seen, however, 
that his Worldly Ambition was not exorbitant ; and he 
very likely takes a humorous or perverse pleasure in 
exalting the gratification of Sense above that of the 
Intellect, in which he must have taken great delight, 
although it failed to answer the Questions in which he, 
in common with all men, was most vitally interested. 

For whatever Reason, however, Omar, as before 
said, has never been popular in his own Country, and 
therefore has been but scantily transmitted abroad. 
The MSS. of his Poems, mutilated beyond the average 
Casualties of Oriental Transcription, are so rare in 
the East as scarce to have reached Westward at all, 
in spite of all the acquisitions of Arms and Science. 

8 



OMAR K H AY YA M 

There is no copy at the India House, none at the 
Bibliotheque Nationale of Paris. We know of but 
one in England : No. 140 of the Ouseley MSS. at 
the Bodleian, written at Shiraz, A.D. 1460. This con- 
tains but 158 Rubaiyat. One in the Asiatic Society's 
Library at Calcutta (of which we have a Copy), con- 
tains (and yet incomplete) 516, though swelled to that 
by all kinds of Repetition and Corruption. So Von 
Hammer speaks of his Copy as containing about 200, 
while Dr. Sprenger catalogues the Lucknow MS. 
at double that number. 1 The Scribes, too, of the 
Oxford and Calcutta MSS. seem to do their Work 
under a sort of Protest ; each beginning with a 
Tetrastich (whether genuine or not), taken out of its 
alphabetical order ; the Oxford with one of Apology ; 
the Calcutta with one of Expostulation, supposed 
(says a Notice prefixed to the MS.) to have arisen 
from a Dream, in which Omar's mother asked about 
his future fate. It may be rendered thus : — 

" Oh Thou who burn'st in Heart for those who burn 
In Hell, whose fires thyself shall feed in turn ; 

How long be crying, ' Mercy on them, God ! ' 
Why, who art Thou to teach, and He to learn ? " 

The Bodleian Quatrain pleads Pantheism by way of 
Justification. 

1 " Since this paper was written" (adds the Reviewer in a note), 
" we have met with a Copy of a very rare Edition, printed at Calcutta 
in 1836. This contains 438 Tetrastichs, with an Appendix containing 
54 others not found in some MSS." 

9 



RUBAlYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



" If I myself upon a looser Creed 
Have loosely strung the Jewel of Good deed, 
Let this one thing for my Atonement plead : 
That One for Two I never did mis-read." 

The Reviewer, 1 to whom I owe the Particulars of 
Omar's Life, concludes his Review by comparing him 
with Lucretius, both as to natural Temper and 
Genius, and as acted upon by the Circumstances in 
which he lived. Both indeed were men of subtle, 
strong, and cultivated Intellect, fine Imagination, and 
Hearts passionate for Truth and Justice ; who justly 
revolted from their Country's false Religion, and false, 
or foolish, Devotion to it ; but who fell short of replac- 
ing what they subverted by such better Hope as others, 
with no better Revelation to guide them, had yet made 
a Law to themselves. Lucretius, indeed, with such 
material as Epicurus furnished, satisfied himself with 
the theory of a vast machine fortuitously constructed, 
and acting by a Law that implied no Legislator ; and so 
composing himself into a Stoical rather than Epicu- 
rean severity of Attitude, sat down to contemplate the 
mechanical Drama of the Universe which he was part 
Actor in; himself and all about him (as in his own 
sublime description of the Roman Theatre) discoloured 
with the lurid reflex of the Curtain suspended between 
the Spectator and the Sun. Omar, more desperate, or 
more careless of any so complicated System as re- 



1 Professor Cowell. 

10 



OMAR K H AY YA M 

suited in nothing but hopeless Necessity, flung his own 
Genius and Learning with a bitter or humorous jest into 
the general Ruin which their insufficient glimpses only 
served to reveal; and, pretending sensual pleasure as 
the serious purpose of Life, only diverted himself with 
speculative problems of Deity, Destiny, Matter and 
Spirit, Good and Evil, and other such questions, easier 
to start than to run down, and the pursuit of which 
becomes a very weary sport at last! 

With regard to the present Translation. The ori- 
ginal Rubaiyat (as, missing an Arabic Guttural, these 
Tetrastkhs are more musically called) are independent 
Stanzas, consisting each of four Lines of equal, though 
varied, Prosody ; sometimes alt rhyming, but oftener 
(as here imitated) the third line a blank. Somewhat 
as in the Greek Alcaic, where the penultimate line 
seems to lift and suspend the Wave that falls over in 
the last. As usual with such kind of Oriental Verse, 
the Rubaiyat follow one another according to Alpha- 
betic Rhyme — a strange succession of Grave and Gay. 
Those here selected are strung into something of an 
Eclogue, with perhaps a less than equal proportion of 
the "Drink and make-merry," which (genuine or not) 
recurs over-frequently in the Original. Either way, 
the Result is sad enough : saddest perhaps when most 
ostentatiously merry : more apt to move Sorrow than 
Anger toward the old Tentmaker, who, after vainly 
endeavouring to unshackle his Steps from Destiny, and 

ii 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

to catch some authentic Glimpse of To-morrow, fell 
back upon To-day (which has outlasted so many To- 
morrows !) as the only Ground he had got to stand 
upon, however momentarily slipping from under his 
Feet. 

[From the Third Edition*'] 

While the second Edition of this version of Omar 
was preparing, Monsieur Nicolas, French Consul at 
Resht, published a very careful and very good Edition 
of the Text, from a lithograph copy at Teheran, com- 
prising 464 Rubaiyat, with translation and notes of his 
own. 

Mons. Nicolas, whose Edition has reminded me of 
several things, and instructed me in others, does not 
consider Omar to be the material Epicurean that I 
have literally taken him for, but a Mystic, shadowing 
the Deity under the figure of Wine, Wine-bearer, etc., 
as Hafiz is supposed to do ; in short, a Sufi poet like 
Hafiz and the rest. 

I cannot see reason to alter my opinion, formed as it 
was more than a dozen years ago 1 when Omar was 
first shown me by one to whom I am indebted for all 
I know of Oriental, and very much of other, literature. 
He admired Omar's Genius so much, that he would 
have adopted any such Interpretation of his meaning 



1 [This was written in 1868.] 

12 



OMAR K H AY YA M 

as Mons. Nicolas's if he could. 1 That he could not, 
appears by his Paper in the Calcutta Review already so 
largely quoted : in which he argues from the Poems 
themselves, as well as from what records remain of 
the Poet's Life. 

And if more were needed to disprove Mons. Nicolas's 
Theory, there is the Biographical Notice which he 
himself has drawn up in direct contradiction to the 
Interpretation of the Poems given in his Notes. (See 
pp. xiii.-xiv. of his Preface.) Indeed I hardly knew 
poor Omar was so far gone till his Apologist informed 
me. For here we see that, whatever were the "Wine 
that Hafiz drank and sang, the veritable Juice of the 
Grape it was which Omar used, not only when carous- 
ing with his friends, but (says Mons. Nicolas) in order 
to excite himself to that pitch of Devotion which 
others reached by cries and "hurlemens." And yet, 
whenever Wine, Wine-bearer, etc., occur in the text — 
which is often enough — Mons. Nicolas carefully anno- 
tates " Dieu," " La Divinit6," etc. : so carefully indeed 
that one is tempted to think that he was indoctrinated 
by the Sufi with whom he read the Poems. (Note to 
Rub. ii. p. 8.) A Persian would naturally wish to vin- 
dicate a distinguished Countryman ; and a Sufi to enrol 



1 Perhaps would have edited the Poems himself some years ago. 
He may now as little approve of my Version on one side, as of Mons. 
Nicolas's Theory on the other. 

13 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

him in his own sect, which already comprises all the 
chief poets in Persia. 

What historical Authority has Mons. Nicolas to 
show that Omar gave himself up " avec passion a 
l'6tude de la philosophic des Soufis " ? (Preface, p. 
xiii.) The Doctrines of Pantheism, Materialism, Ne- 
cessity, etc., were not peculiar to the Sufi ; nor to 
Lucretius before them ; nor to Epicurus before him ; 
probably the very original Irreligion of Thinking 
men from the first ; and very likely to be the spon- 
taneous growth of a Philosopher living in an Age of 
social and political barbarism, under shadow of one 
of the Two-and-Seventy Religions supposed to divide 
the world. Von Hammer (according to Sprenger's 
Oriental Catalogue) speaks of Omar as " a Free-thinker, 
and sl greed opponent of Sufism; " perhaps because, while 
holding much of their Doctrine, he would not pretend 
to any inconsistent severity of morals. Sir W. Ouseley 
has written a note to something of the same effect on 
the fly-leaf of the Bodleian MS. And in two Rubaiyat 
of Mons. Nicolas's own Edition Suf and Sufi are both 
disparagingly named. 

No doubt many of these Quatrains seem unaccount- 
able unless mystically interpreted ; but many more as 
unaccountable unless literally. Were the Wine spirit- 
ual, for instance, how wash the Body with it when 
dead ? Why make cups of the dead clay to be filled 
with — " La Divinit6"— by some succeeding Mystic? 

14 



OMAR K H AY YA M 



Mons. Nicolas himself is puzzled by some " bizarres " 
and "trop Orientales" allusions and images — " d'une 
sensualit6 quelquefois revoltante " indeed — which 
"les convenances" do not permit him to translate; 
but still which the reader cannot but refer to " La 
Divinite." * No doubt also many of the Quatrains in 
the Teheran, as in the Calcutta, Copies are spurious ; 
such Rubaiyzt being the common form of Epigram in 
Persia. But this, at best, tells as much one way as 
another; nay, the Sufi, who may be considered the 
Scholar and Man of Letters in Persia, would be far 
more likely than the careless Epicure to interpolate 
what favours his own view of the Poet. I observe 
that very few of the more mystical Quatrains are in 
the Bodleian MS., which must be one of the oldest, as 
dated at Shiraz, A. H. 865, A. D. 1460. And this, I 
think, especially distinguishes Omar (I cannot help 
calling him by his — no, not Christian — familiar name) 



1 A Note to Quatrain 234 admits that, however clear the mystical 
meaning of such Images must be to Europeans, they are not quoted 
without " rougissant " even by laymen in Persia — " Quant aux 
termes de tendresse qui commencent ce quatrain, comme tant 
d'autres dans ce recueil, nos lecteurs, habitue's maintenant a 
l'6tranget6 des expressions si souvent employees par Kheyam pour 
rendre ses pens6es sur l'amour divin, et a la singularity de ses images 
trop orientales, d'une sensuality quelquefois revoltante, n'auront pas 
de peine a se persuader qu'il s'agit dela Divinite, bien que cette con- 
viction soit vivement discut£e par les moullahs musulmans et meme 
par beaucoup de laiques, qui rougissent ventablement d'une pareille 
licence de leur compatriote a 1'egard des choses spirituelles." 

*5 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

from all other Persian Poets: That, whereas with 
them the Poet is lost in his Song, the Man in Allegory 
and Abstraction; we seem to have the Man — the 
Bonhomme — Omar himself, with all his Humours and 
Passions, as frankly before us as if we were really at 
Table with him, after the Wine had gone round. 

I must say that I, for one, never wholly believed in 
the Mysticism of Hafiz. It does not appear there was 
any danger in holding and singing Sufi Pantheism, so 
long as the Poet made his Salaam to Mohammed at 
the beginning and end of his Song. Under such condi- 
tions Jelaluddin, Jami, Attar, and others sang; using 
Wine and Beauty indeed as Images to illustrate, not 
as a Mask to hide, the Divinity they were celebrating. 
Perhaps some Allegory less liable to mistake or abuse 
had been better among so inflammable a People : much 
more so when, as some think with Hafiz and Omar, the 
abstract is not only likened to, but identified with, the 
sensual Image ; hazardous, if not to the Devotee him- 
self, yet to his weaker Brethren ; and worse for the 
Profane in proportion as the Devotion of the Initiated 
grew warmer. And all for what? To be tantalized 
with Images of sensual enjoyment which must be 
renounced if one would approximate a God, who, 
according to the Doctrine, is Sensual Matter as well as 
Spirit, and into whose Universe one expects uncon- 
sciously to merge after Death, without hope of any 
posthumous Beatitude in another world to compensate 

16 



OMAR K H AY YA M 



for all one's self-denial in this. Lucretius's blind 
Divinity certainly merited, and probably got, as much 
self-sacrifice as this of the Sufi; and the burden of 
Omar's Song — if not "Let us eat" — is assuredly — 
" Let us drink, for To-morow we die ! " And if Hafiz 
meant quite otherwise by a similar language, he surely 
miscalculated when he devoted his Life and Genius to 
so equivocal a Psalmody as, from his Day to this, 
has been said and sung by any rather than Spiritual 
Worshippers. 

However, as there is some traditional presumption, 
and certainly the opinion of some learned men, in 
favour of Omar's being a Sufi — and even something of 
a Saint — those who please may so interpret his Wine 
and Cup-bearer. On the other hand, as there is far 
more historical certainty of his being a Philosopher of 
scientific Insight and Ability far beyond that of the 
Age and Country he lived in ; of such moderate 
worldly Ambition as becomes a Philosopher, and such 
moderate wants as rarely satisfy a Debauchee ; other 
readers may be content to believe with me that, while 
the Wine Omar celebrates is simply the Juice of the 
Grape, he bragged more than he drank of it, in very 
defiance perhaps of that Spiritual Wine which left its 
Notaries sunk in Hypocrisy or Disgust. 



*7 



THE RUBAlYAT OF 
OMAR KHAYYAM 



WAKE ! For the Sun, who scatter'd into flight 
The Stars before him from the Field of Night, 
Drives Night along with them from Heav'n, 
and strikes 
The Sultan's Turret with a Shaft of Light. 

ii 
Before the phantom of False morning died, 
Methought a Voice within the Tavern cried, 
" When all the Temple is prepared within, 
Why nods the drowsy Worshipper outside ? " 

in 
And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before 
The Tavern shouted— " Open then the Door! 

You know how little while we have to stay, 
And, once departed, may return no more." 

IV 

Now the New Year reviving old Desires, 
The thoughtful Soul to Solitude retires, 

Where the White Hand of Moses on the Bough 
Puts out, and Jesus from the Ground suspires. 

19 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



V 

Irani indeed is gone with all his Rose, 

And jamshyd's Sev'n-ring'd Cup where no one knows; 

'Jut still a Ruby kindles in the Vine, 
And many a Garden by the Water blows. 



VI 

And David's lips are lockt; but in divine 
High-piping Pehlevi, with " Wine ! Wine! Wine! 

Red Wine!" — the Nightingale cries to the Rose 
That sallow cheek of hers to' incarnadine. 



VII 

Come, fill the Cup, and in the fire of Spring 
Your Winter-garment of Repentance fling: 

The Bird of Time has but a little way 
To flutter — and the Bird is on the Wing. 



VIII 

Whether at Naish&pur or Babylon, 
Whether the Cup with sweet or bitter run, 

The Wine of Life keeps oozing drop by drop, 
The Leaves of Life keep falling one by one. 

20 



Fitzgerald version 



IX 

Each Morn a thousand Roses brings, you say; 
Yes, but where leaves the Rose of Yesterday? 

And this first Summer month that brings the Rose 
Shall take Jamshyd and Kaikobad away. 



Well, let it take them ! What have we to do 
With Kaikobad the Great, or Kaikhosru? 

Let Zal and Rustum bluster as they will, 
Or Hatim call to Supper — heed not you. 



XI 

With me along the strip of Herbage strown 
That just divides the desert from the sown,. 

Where name of Slave and Sultan is forgot — 
And Peace to Mahmud on his golden Throne! 



XII 

A Book of Verses underneath the Bough, 
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread— and Thou 

Beside me singing in the Wilderness — 
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow ! 

21 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XIH 

Some for the Glories of This World ; and some 
Sigh for the Prophet's Paradise to come; 

Ah, take the Cash, and let the Credit go, 
Nor heed the rumble of a distant Drum ! 



XIV 

Look to the blowing Rose about us — " Lo, 
Laughing," she says, "into the world I blow, 

At once the silken tassel of my Purse 
Tear, and its Treasure on the Garden throw." 



xv 
And those who husbanded the Golden grain, 
And those who flung it to the winds like Rain, 

Alike to no such aureate Earth are turn'd 
As, buried once, Men want dug up again. 



XVI 

The Worldly Hope men set their Hearts upon 
Turns Ashes — or it prospers ; and anon, 

Like Snow upon the Desert's dusty Face, 
Lighting a little hour or two — is gone. 

22 



Fitzgerald version 



XVII 

Think, in this batter'd Caravanserai 

Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day, 

How Sultan after Sultan with his Pomp 
Abode his destined Hour, and went his way. 



XVIII 

They say the Lion and the Lizard keep 

The Courts where Jamshyd gloried and drank deep 

And Bahram, that great Hunter — the Wild Ass 
Stamps o'er his Head, but cannot break his Sleep. 



XIX 

I sometimes think that never blows so red 
The Rose as where some buried Caesar bled ; 

That every Hyacinth the Garden wears 
Dropt in her Lap from some once lovely Head. 



xx 

And this reviving Herb whose tender Green 
Fledges the River-Lip on which we lean — 
Ah, lean upon it lightly! for who knows 
From what once lovely Lip it springs unseen! 

23 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XXI 

Ah, my Beloved, fill the Cup that clears 
To-day of past Regrets and Future Fears: 
To-morrow I — Why, To-morrow I may be 
Myself with Yesterday's Sev'n thousand Years. 



XXII 

For some we loved, the loveliest and the best 
That from his Vintage rolling Time hath prest, 
Have drunk their Cup a Round or two before, 
And one by one crept silently to rest. 



XXIII 

And we, that now make merry in the Room 
They left, and Summer dresses in new bloom, 

Ourselves must we beneath the Couch of Earth 
Descend — ourselves to make a Couch — for whom ? 



XXIV 

Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend, 
Before we too into the Dust descend ; 

Dust into Dust and under Dust to lie, 
Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and— sans End 1 

24 



Fitzgerald version 



XXV 

Alike for those who for To-day prepare, 
And those that after some To-morrow stare, 

A Muezzin from the Tower of Darkness cries, 
"Fools! your Reward is neither Here nor There." 



XXVI 

Why, all the Saints and Sages who discuss'd 
Of the Two Worlds so wisely — they are thrust 

Like foolish Prophets forth ; their Words to Scorn 
Are scatter'd, and their Mouths are stopt with Dust. 



XXVII 

Myself when young did eagerly frequent 
Doctor and Saint, and heard great argument 

About it and about : but evermore 
Came out by the same door where in I went. 



XXVIII 

With them the seed of Wisdom did I sow, 

And with mine own hand wr ht to make it grow; 

And this was all the Harvest that I reap'd — 
"I came like Water, and like Wind I go." 

*5 



RUBAlYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XXIX 

Into this Universe, and Why not knowing 
Nor Whence, like Water willy-nilly flowing; 
And out of it, as Wind along the Waste, 
I know not Whither, willy-nilly blowing. 



XXX 

What, without asking, hither hurried Whence? 
And, without asking, Whither hurried hence ! 

Oh, many a Cup of this forbidden Wine 
Must drown the memory of that insolence ! 



XXXI 

Up from Earth's Centre through the Seventh Gate 
I rose, and on the Throne of Saturn sate, 

And many a Knot unravel'd by the Road; 
But not the Master-knot of Human Fate. 



XXXII 

There was the Door to which I found no Key; 
There was the Veil through which I might not see 

Some little talk awhile of Me and Thee 
There was — and then no more of Thee and Me. 

26 



Fitzgerald version 



XXXIII 

Earth could not answer ; nor the Seas that mourn 
In flowing Purple, of their Lord forlorn ; 

Nor rolling Heaven, with all his Signs reveal'd 
And hidden by the sleeve of Night and Morn. 



xxxiv 
Then of the Thee in Me who works behind 
The Veil, I lifted up my hands to find 

A Lamp amid the Darkness ; and I heard, 
As from Without— " The Me within Thee blind!" 



xxxv 
Then to the Lip of this poor earthen Urn 
I lean'd, the Secret of my Life to learn: 

And Lip to Lip it murmur'd — " While you live, 
Drink! — for, once dead, you never shall return." 



xxxvi 
I think the Vessel, that with fugitive 
Articulation answer'd, once did live, 

And drink ; and Ah ! the passive Lip I kiss'd, 
How many Kisses might it take — and give ! 

27 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XXXVII 

For I remember stopping by the way 

To watch a Potter thumping his wet Clay: 

And with its all-obliterated Tongue 
It murmur'd-" Gently, Brother, gently, pray!" 



XXXVIII 

And has not such a Story from of Old 
Down Man's successive generations roll'd 

Of such a clod of saturated Earth 
Cast by the Maker into Human mould ? 



xxxix 
And not a drop that from our Cups we throw 
For Earth to drink of, but may steal below 

To quench the fire of Anguish in some Eye 
There hidden — far beneath, and long ago. 



XL 

As then the Tulip for her morning sup 

Of Heav'nly Vintage from the soil looks up, 

Do you devoutly do the like, till Heav'n 
To Earth invert you — like an empty Cup. 

28 



Fitzgerald version 



XLI 

Perplext no more with Human or Divine, 
To-morrow's tangle to the winds resign, 
And lose your fingers in the tresses of 
The Cypress-slender Minister of Wine. 

XLII 

And if the Wine you drink, the Lip you press, 
End in what All begins and ends in — Yes; 

Think then you are To-day what Yesterday 
You were — To-morrow you shall not be less. 



XLIII 

So when that Angel of the darker Drink 
At last shall find you by the river-brink, 
And, offering his Cup, invite your Soul 
Forth to your Lips to quaff — you shall not shrink. 

XLIV 

Why, if the Soul can fling the Dust aside, 
And naked on the Air of Heaven ride, 

Wer' 't not a Shame — wer' 't not a Shame for him 
In this clay carcase crippled to abide? 

29 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XLV 

'T is but a Tent where takes his one day's rest 
A Sultan to the realm of Death addrest ; 
The Sultan rises, and the dark Ferrash 
Strikes, and prepares it for another Guest. 



XLVI 

And fear not lest Existence closing your 

Account, and mine, should know the like no more; 

The Eternal Saki from that Bowl has pour'd 
Millions of Bubbles like us, and will pour. 



XLVII 

When You and I behind the Veil are past, 

Oh, but the long, long while the World shall last, 

Which of our Coming and Departure heeds 
As the Sea's self should heed a pebble-cast. 



XLVIII 

A Moment's Halt — a momentary taste 

Of Being from the Well amid the Waste — 

And Lo ! — the phantom Caravan has reacht 
The Nothing it set out from — Oh, make haste! 

30 



1 






Fitzgerald version 



XLIX 

Would you that spangle of Existence spend 
About the secret — quick about it, Friend! 

A Hair perhaps divides the False and True — 
And upon what, prithee, may life depend? 



L 

A Hair perhaps divides the False and True ; 
Yes ; and a single Alif were the clue — 

Could you but find it — to the Treasure-house, 
And peradventure to The Master too ; 



LI 

Whose secret Presence, through Creation's veins 
Running Quicksilver-like eludes your pains ; 

Taking all shapes from Man to Mahi ; and 
They change and perish all — but He remains ; 



LII 

A moment guess'd — then back behind the Fold 
Immerst of Darkness round the Drama roll'd 

Which, for the Pastime of Eternity, 
He doth Himself contrive, enact, behold. 

3i 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LIII 

But if in vain, down on the stubborn floor 
Of Earth, and up to Heav'n's unopening Door, 

You gaze TO-DAY, while You are You — how then 
To-morrow, You when shall be You no more? 



LIV 

Waste not your Hour, nor in the vain pursuit 
Of This and That endeavour and dispute ; 
Better be jocund with the fruitful Grape 
Than sadden after none, or bitter, Fruit. 



LV 

You know, my Friends, with what a brave Carouse 
I made a Second Marriage in my house ; 

Divorced old barren Reason from my Bed, 
And took the Daughter of the Vine to Spouse. 









LVI 

For " Is" and " IS-NOT " though with Rule and Line 
And " Up-and-down " by Logic I define, 
Of all that one should care to fathom, I 
Was never deep in anything but — Wine. 

32 



Fitzgerald version 



LVII 

Ah, but my Computations, People say, 
Reduced the Year to better reckoning? — Nay, 

'Twas only striking from the Calendar 
Unborn To-morrow, and dead Yesterday. 



LVIII 

And lately, by the Tavern Door agape, 

Came shining through the Dusk an Angel Shape 

Bearing a Vessel on his Shoulder; and 
He bid me taste of it; and 'twas — the Grape! 



LIX 

The Grape that can with Logic absolute 
The Two-and-Seventy jarring Sects confute 

The sovereign Alchemist that in a trice 
Life's leaden metal into Gold transmute : 



LX 

The mighty Mahmud, Allah-breathing Lord, 
That all the misbelieving and black Horde 

Of Fears and Sorrows that infest the Soul 
Scatters before him with his whirlwind Sword. 
3 33 



RUBAIYXT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LXI 

Why, be this Juice the growth of God, who dare 
Blaspheme the twisted tendril as a Snare? 

A Blessing, we should use it, should we not? 
And if a Curse — why, then, Who set it there ? 



LXII 

I must abjure the Balm of Life, I must, 
Scared by some After-reckoning ta'en on trust, 
Or lured with Hope of some Diviner Drink, 
To fill the Cup — when crumbled into Dust! 



LXIII 

Oh threats of Hell and Hopes of Paradise ! 
One thing at least is certain — ^bis Life flies ; 

One thing is certain and the rest is Lies ; 
The Flower that once has blown for ever dies. 



LXIV 

Strange, is it not? that of the myriads who 
Before us pass'd the door of Darkness through, 

Not one returns to tell us of the Road, 
, Which to discover we must travel too. 

34 



Fitzgerald version 



LXV 

The Revelations of Devout and Learn'd 
Who rose before us, and as Prophets burn'd, 

Are all but Stories, which, awoke from Sleep 
They told their comrades, and to Sleep return'd. 



LXVI 

I sent my Soul through the Invisible, 
Some letter of that After-life to spell : 

And by and by my Soul return'd to me, 
And answer'd " I Myself am Heav'n and Hell : 



LXVII 

Heav'n but the Vision of fulfill'd Desire, 
And Hell the Shadow from a Soul on fire, 

Cast on the Darkness into which Ourselves, 
So late emerged from, shall so soon expire. 



\ 



LXVIII 

We are no other than a moving row 

Of Magic Shadow-shapes that come and go 

Round with the Sun-illumined Lantern held 
In Midnight by the Master of the Show ; 

35 



/< / 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LXIX 

But helpless Pieces of the Game He plays 
Upon this Chequer-board of Nights and Days ; 

Hither and thither moves, and checks, and slays, 
And one by one back in the Closet lays. 



LXX 

The Ball no question makes of Ayes and Noes, 
But Here or There as strikes the Player goes ; 
And He that toss'd you down into the Field, 
He knows about it all — he knows — HE knows! 



LXXI 

^Lw Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, 
Moves on : nor all your Piety nor Wit 

Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, 
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it. 



LXXII 

And that inverted Bowl they call the Sky, 
Whereunder crawling coop'd we live and die, 

Lift not your hands to It for help — for It 
As impotently moves as you or I. 

36 



Fitzgerald version 



LXXIII 

With Earth's first Clay They did the Last Man knead, 
And there of the Last Harvest sow'd the Seed : 

And the first Morning of Creation wrote 
What the Last Dawn of Reckoning shall read. 



LXXIV 

Yesterday 'This Day's Madness did prepare ; 
To-MORROW'S Silence, Triumph, or Despair : 

Drink ! for you know not whence you came, nor why 
Drink! for you know not why you go, nor where. 

LXXV 

I tell you this — When, started from the Goal, 
Over the flaming shoulders of the Foal 

Of Heav'n Parwin and Mushtari they flung, 
In my predestin'd Plot of Dust and Soul 

LXXVI 

The Vine had struck a fibre : which about 
If clings my being — let the Dervish flout; 

Of my Base metal may be filed a Key 
That shall unlock the Door he howls without. 

37 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LXXVII 

And this I know : whether the one True Light 
Kindle to Love, or Wrath-consume me quite, 

One Flash of It within the Tavern caught 
Better than in the Temple lost outright. 



LXXVIII 

What ! out of senseless Nothing to provoke 
A conscious Something to resent the yoke 

Of unpermitted Pleasure, under pain 
Of Everlasting Penalties, if broke ! 



LXXIX 

What! from his helpless Creature be repaid 
Pure Gold for what he lent him dross-allay'd 

Sue for a Debt he never did contract, 
And cannot answer — Oh the sorry trade ! 



LXXX 

Oh Thou, who didst with pitfall and with gin 
Beset the Road I was to wander in, 

Thou wilt not with Predestined Evil round 
Enmesh, and then impute my Fall to Sin ! 

38 



Fitzgerald version 



LXXXI 

Oh Thou, who Man of baser Earth didst make, 
And ev'n with Paradise devise the Snake : 

For all the Sin wherewith the Face of Man 
Is blacken'd — Man's forgiveness give — and take ! 



LXXXII 

As under cover of departing Day 
Slunk hunger-stricken Ramazan away, 

Once more within the Potter's house alone 
I stood, surrounded by the Shapes of Clay. 



LXXXIII 

Shapes of all Sorts and Sizes, great and small, 
That stood along the floor and by the wall ; 

And some loquacious Vessels were ; and some 
Listen'd perhaps, but never talk'd at all. 

39 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LXXXIV 

Said one among them — " Surely not in vain 
My substance of the common Earth was ta'en 

And to this Figure moulded, to be broke, 
Or trampled back to shapeless Earth again." 

LXXXV 

Then said a Second — "Ne'er a peevish Boy 
Would break the Bowl from which he drank in joy; 

And He that with his hand the Vessel made 
Will surely not in after Wrath destroy." 



LXXXVI 

After a momentary silence spake 

Some Vessel of a more ungainly Make; 

" They sneer at me for leaning all awry : 
What! did the Hand then of the Potter shake?" 



LXXXVII 

Whereat some one of the loquacious Lot — 
I think a Sufi pipkin — waxing hot — 

"All this of Pot and Potter — Tell me then, 
Who is the Potter, pray, and who the Pot?" 

40 



Fitzgerald version 



LXXXVIII 

" Why," said another, " Some there are who tell 
Of one who threatens he will toss to Hell 

The luckless Pots he marr'd in making — Pish ! 
He's a Good Fellow, and 'twill all be well." 

LXXXIX 

"Well," murmur'd one, " Let whoso make or buy, 
My Clay with long Oblivion is gone dry: ^ 

But fill me with the old familiar Juice, 
Methinks I might recover by and by." 

xc 
So while the Vessels one by one were speaking, 
The little Moon look'd in that all were seeking: 

And then they jogg'd each other, "Brother! Brother! 
Now for the Porter's shoulder-knot a-creaking ! " 



4i 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XCI 

Ah, with the Grape my fading Life provide, 
And wash the Body whence the Life has died, 

And lay me, shrouded in the living Leaf, 
By some not unfrequented Garden-side. 



XCII 

That ev'n my buried Ashes such a snare 
Of Vintage shall fling up into the Air 

As not a True-believer passing by 
But shall be overtaken unaware. 



XCIII 

Indeed the Idols I have loved so long 

Have done my credit in this World much wrong : 

Have drown'd my Glory in a shallow Cup, 
And sold my Reputation for a Song. 



xciv 
Indeed, indeed, Repentance oft before 
I swore — but was I sober when I swore ? 

And then and then came Spring, and Rose-in-hand 
My thread-bare Penitence apieces tore. 

42 



Fitzgerald version 



xcv 
And much as Wine has play'd the Infidel, 
And robb'd me of my Robe of Honour — Well, 

I wonder often what the Vintners buy 
One half so precious as the stuff they sell. 



xcvi 
Yet Ah, that Spring should vanish with the Rose ! 
That Youth's sweet-scented manuscript should close ! 

The Nightingale that in the branches sang, 
Ah whence, and whither flown again, who knows ! 



xcvn 
Would but the Desert of the Fountain yield 
One glimpse — if dimly, yet indeed, reveal'd, 

To which the fainting Traveller might spring, 
As springs the trampled herbage of the field! 



xcvm 
Would but some winged Angel ere too late 
Arrest the yet unfolded Roll of Fate, 

And make the stern Recorder otherwise 
Enregister, or quite obliterate ! 

43 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XCIX 

Ah Love! could you and I with Him conspire 
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire, 
Would not we shatter it to bits — and then 
Re-mould it nearer to the Heart's Desire ! 



c 
Yon rising Moon that looks for us again — 
How oft hereafter will she wax and wane ; 

How oft hereafter rising look for us 
Through this same Garden — and for one in vain ! 



ci 
And when like her, oh Saki, you shall pass 
Among the Guests Star-scatter'd on the Grass, 

And in your joyous errand reach the spot 
Where I made One — turn down an empty Glass ! 

TAMAM 



44 



NOTES BY EDWARD FITZGERALD 

[ The references are, except in the first note only, to the stanzas of the 
Fourth Edition,'] The numbering is the same as in the Fifth Edition. 



(Stanza I.) Flinging a Stone into the Cup was the signal for " To 
Horse ! " in the Desert. 

(II.) The "False Dawn;" Subhi Kazib, a transient Light on the 
Horizon about an hour before the Subhi sadik, or True Dawn ; a well- 
known Phenomenon in the East. 

(IV.) New Year. Beginning with the Vernal Equinox, it must be 
remembered; and (howsoever the old Solar Year is practically super- 
seded by the clumsy Lunar Year that dates from the Mohammedan 
Hijra) still commemorated by a Festival that is said to have been 
appointed by the very Jamshyd whom Omar so often talks of, and 
whose yearly Calendar he helped to rectify. 

" The sudden approach and rapid advance of the Spring," says Mr. 
Binning, " are very striking. Before the Snow is well off the Ground, 
the Trees burst into Blossom, and the Flowers start from the Soil. 
At Now Rooz {their New Year's Day) the Snow was lying in patches 
on the Hills and in the shaded Vallies, while the Fruit-trees in the 
Gardens were budding beautifully, and green Plants and Flowers 
springing up on the Plains on every side — 

' And on old Hyems' Chin and icy Crown 
An odorous Chaplet of sweet Summer buds 
Is, as in mockery, set.' — 

Among the Plants newly appeared I recognized some old Acquaint- 
ances I had not seen for many a Year : among these, two varieties of 
the Thistle ; a coarse species of Daisy, like the ' Horse-gowan ' ; red 
and white Clover ; the Dock ; the blue Corn-flower ; and that vulgar 
Herb the Dandelion rearing its yellow crest on the Banks of the 
Water-courses." The Nightingale was not yet heard, for the Rose 
was not yet blown : but an almost identical Blackbird and Wood- 
pecker helped to make up something of a North-country Spring. 

" The White Hand of Moses." Exodus iv. 6 ; where Moses draws 
forth his Hand — not, according to the Persians, "leprous as Snow/' 
— but white, as our May-blossom in Spring perhaps. According to 
them also the Healing Power of Jesus resided in his Breath. 

45 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



(V.) Iram, planted by King Shaddad, and now sunk somewhere in 
the Sands of Arabia. Jamshyd's Seven-ring'd Cup was typical of the 
7 Heavens, 7 Planets, 7 Seas, &c, and was a Divining Cup, 

(VI.) Pehlevu the old Heroic Sanskrit of Persia. Hafiz also speaks 
of the Nightingale's Pehl&ui, which did not change with the People's. 

I am not sure if the fourth line refers to the Red Rose looking 
sickly, or to the Yellow Rose that ought to be Red ; Red, White, and 
Yellow Roses all common in Persia. I think that Southey, in his 
Common-Place Book, quotes from some Spanish author about the 
Rose being White till 10 o'clock; " Rosa Perfecta" at 2; and " per- 
fecta incarnada " at 5. 

(X.) Rustum, the "Hercules" of Persia, and Zal his Father, 
whose exploits are among the most celebrated in the Shah-nama. 
Hatim Tai, a well-known type of Oriental Generosity. 

(XIII.) A Drum — beaten outside a Palace. 

(XIV.) That is, the Rose's Golden Centre. 

(XVIII.) Persepolis; call'd also Takht-i-Jamshyd — The Throne of 
Jamshyd, "King Splendid/' of the mythical Peshdadian Dynasty, and 
supposed (according to the Shah-nama) to have been founded and 
built by him. Others refer it to the Work of the Genie King, Jan Ibn 
Jan — who also built the Pyramids — before the time of Adam. 

Bahrain Giir — Ba.hra.rn of the Wild Ass — a Sassanian Sovereign — 
had also his Seven Castles (like the King of Bohemia !) each of a dif- 
ferent Colour: each with a Royal Mistress within; each of whom 
tells him a Story, as told in one of the most famous Poems of Persia, 
written by Amir Khusraw : all these Sevens also figuring (according 
to Eastern Mysticism) the Seven Heavens; and perhaps the Book 
itself that Eighth, into which the mystical Seven transcend, and 
within which they revolve. The Ruins of Three of those Towers 
are yet shown by the Peasantry; as also the Swamp in which 
Bahram sunk, like the Master of Ravenswood, while pursuing his 
Giir, 

46 



NOTES 



The Palace thai to Heatfn his pillars threw, 
And Kings the forehead on his threshold drew — 

I saw the solitary Ringdove there, 
And " Coo coo, coo/' she cried; and " Coo, coo, coo." 

This Quatrain Mr. Binning found, among several of Hafiz and 
others, inscribed by some stray hand among the ruins of Persepolis. 
The Ringdove's ancient Pehlevi Coo, Coo, Coo, signifies also in Per- 
sian " Where? Where? Where?" In Attar's "Bird-parliament" 
she is reproved by the Leader of the Birds for sitting still, and for 
ever harping on that one note of lamentation for her lost Yusuf. 

Apropos of Omar's Red Roses in Stanza xix, I am reminded of an 
old English Superstition, that our Anemone Pulsatilla, or purple 
" Pasque Flower " (which grows plentifully about the Fleam Dyke, 
near Cambridge), grows only where Danish Blood has been spilt. 

(XXI.) A thousand years to each Planet. 
(XXXI.) Saturn, Lord of the Seventh Heaven. 

(XXXII.) ME-AND-THEE: some dividual Existence or Person- 
ality distinct from the Whole. 

(XXXVII.) One of the Persian Poets — Attar, I think — has a 
pretty story about this. A thirsty Traveller dips his hand into a 
Spring of Water to drink from. By-and-by comes another who 
draws up and drinks from an earthen Bowl, and then departs, leaving 
his Bowl behind him. The first Traveller takes it up for another 
draught ; but is surprised to find that the same Water which had 
tasted sweet from his own hand tastes bitter from the earthen Bowl. 
But a Voice — from Heaven, I think — tells him the clay from which 
the Bowl is made was once Man; and, into whatever shape renewed, 
can never lose the bitter flavour of Mortality. 

(XXXIX.) The custom of throwing a little Wine on the ground 
before drinking still continues in Persia, and perhaps generally in the 
East. Mons. Nicolas considered it " un signe de lib^ralite", et en 
meme temps un avertissement que le buveur doit vider sa coupe 

47 



RUBAlYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



jusqu'a la derniere goutte." Is it not more likely an ancient Super- 
stition; a Libation to propitiate Earth, or make her an Accomplice 
in the illicit Revel ? Or, perhaps, to divert the Jealous Eye by some 
sacrifice of superfluity, as with the Ancients of the West ? With 
Omar we see something more is signified ; the precious Liquor is not 
lost, but sinks into the ground to refresh the dust of some poor 
Wine-worshipper foregone. 

Thus Hafiz, copying Omar in so many ways : " When thou drinkest 
Wine pour a draught on the ground. Wherefore fear the Sin which 
brings to another Gain ? " 

(XLIII.) According to one beautiful Oriental Legend, AzrSel 
accomplishes his mission by holding to the nostril an Apple from the 
Tree of Life. 

This and the two following Stanzas would have been withdrawn, 
as somewhat de trop, from the Text, but for advice which I least like 
to disregard. 

(LI.) From Mah to Mahi; from Fish to Moon. 

(LVI.) A Jest, of course, at his Studies. A curious mathematical 
Quatrain of Omar's has been pointed out to me; the more curi- 
ous because almost exactly parallel'd by some Verses of Doctor 
Donne's, that are quoted in Izaak Walton's Lives ! Here is Omar : 
" You and I are the image of a pair of compasses ; though we have 
two heads (sc. our feet) we have one body ; when we have fixed the 
centre for our circle, we bring our heads (sc. feet) together at the 
end." Dr. Donne: — 

" If we be two, we two are so 

As stiff twin-compasses are two ; 

Thy Soul, the fixt foot, makes no show 

To move, but does if the other do. 

" And though thine in the centre sit, 
Yet when my other far does roam, 
Thine leans and hearkens after it, 
And grows erect as mine comes home. 

4 8 



NOTES 



" Such thou must be to me, who must 
Like the other foot obliquely run ; 
Thy firmness makes my circle just, 
And me to end where I begun." 

(LIX.) The Seventy-two Religions supposed to divide the World, 
including Islamism, as some think :, but others not. 

(LX.) Alluding to Sultan Mahmud's Conquest of India and its 
dark people. 

(LXVIII.) Fknusi khiyaU a Magic-lantern still used in India; the 
cylindrical Interior being painted with various Figures, and so lightly 
poised and ventilated as to revolve round the lighted Candle within. 

(LXX.) A very mysterious Line in the Original : — 

danad danad danad 

breaking off something like our Wood-pigeon's Note, which she is 
said to take up just where she left off. 

(LXXV.) Parwin and Mushtari — The Pleiads and Jupiter. 

(LXXXVII.) This Relation of Pot and Potter to Man and his 
Maker figures far and wide in the Literature of the World, from the 
time of the Hebrew Prophets to the present ; when it may finally 
take the name of " Pot theism," by which Mr. Carlyle ridiculed Ster- 
ling's " Pantheism." My Sheikh, whose knowledge flows in from all 
quarters, writes to me : — 

" Apropos of old Omar's Pots, did I ever tell you the sentence I 
found in ' Bishop Pearson on the Creed ' ? ' Thus are we wholly at 
the disposal of His will, and our present and future condition framed 
and ordered by His free, but wise and just decrees. Hath not the pot- 
ter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto 
honour, and another unto dishonour? (Rom. ix. 21.) And can that 
earth-artificer have a freer power over his brother potsherd (both being 
made of the same metal), than God hath over him, who, by the 
4 49 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



strange fecundity of His omnipotent power, first made the clay out 
of nothing, and then him out of that ? ' " 

And again — from a very different quarter: — "I had to refer the 
other day to Aristophanes, and came by chance on a curious Speak- 
ing-pot story in the Vespae, which I had quite forgotten. 

*iXok\€ W v. "Akov€, |j.4| <J>€vy ■ ev Zvpdpei yvvfi ttotc 1. 1435 

KaT€0|' €X>VOV. 

KaT-fjYopos. Taw iy<b napTvpojAai. 

*t. Ovxivos olv tx°>v Tl v* lircnapTvpaTO ■ 

E10* tj Svpapiris etircv, el val Tav Kopav 

T'fjv jxapTvpfav ravrr\v Ido-as, «v rdxci 

€w£8€<T(iov iirpCw, vovv av ctxcs irXciova. 

" The Pot calls a bystander to be a witness to his bad treatment. 
The woman says, « If, by Proserpine, instead of all this * testifying ' 
(comp. Cuddie and his mother in 'Old Mortality'!) you would buy 
yourself a rivet, it would show more sense in you ! ' The Scholiast 
explains echinus as dtyyos ti 4k Kcpajjiov." 

One more illustration for the oddity's sake from the " Autobiog- 
raphy of a Cornish Rector," by the late James Hamley Tregenna, 
1871. 

"There was one old Fellow in our Company — he was so like a 
Figure in the ' Pilgrim's Progress' that Richard always calls him the 
' ALLEGORY,' with a long white beard — a rare Appendage in those 
days — and a Face the colour of which seemed to have been baked 
in, like the Faces one used to see on Earthenware Jugs. In our 
Country-dialect Earthenware is called ' Clome ' / so the Boys of the 
Village used to shout after him — 'Go back to the Potter, old Clome- 
face, and get baked over again.' For the ' Allegory,' though shrewd 
enough in most things, had the reputation of being ' S3.ift-ba.ked/ 
i.e., of weak intellect." 

(XC.) At the Close of the Fasting Month, Ramazan (which makes 
the Musulman unhealthy and unamiable), the first Glimpse of the 
New Moon (who rules their division of the Year) is looked for with 

50 



NOTES 



the utmost Anxiety, and hailed with Acclamation. Then it is that the 
Porter's Knot may be heard — toward the Cellar, Omar has else- 
where a pretty Quatrain about the same Moon: — 

" Be of Good Cheer — the sullen Month will die, 
And a young Moon requite us by and by : 

Look how the Old One, meagre, bent, and wan 
With Age and Fast, is fainting from the Sky ! " 



51 



VARIATIONS IN THE TEXT 

OF THE FIRST, SECOND, AND THIRD EDI- 
TIONS OF FITZGERALD'S TRANSLATION 



I x Awake ! for Morning in the Bowl of Night 

ist Ed. Has flung the Stone that puts the Stars to Flight : 

And Lo ! the Hunter of the East has caught 
The Sultan's Turret in a Noose of Light. 

2d Ed. Wake ! For the Sun behind yon Eastern height 

Has chased the Session of the Stars from Night; 
And, to the field of Heav'n ascending, strikes 
The Sultan's Turret with a Shaft of Light. 

II Dreaming when Dawn's Left Hand was in the Sky 

ist Ed. I heard a Voice within the Tavern cry, 

" Awake, my Little ones, and fill the Cup 
Before Life's Liquor in its Cup be dry." 

2d Ed. "Why lags the drowsy Worshipper outside?" 

V Iram indeed is gone with all its Rose, 

ist Ed. And Jamshyd's Sev'n-ring'd Cup where no one knows ; 

But still the Vine her ancient Ruby yields, 
And still a Garden by the Water blows. 

2d & 3d Eds. But still a Ruby gushes from the Vine, 

VI "Red Wine!" — the Nightingale cries to the Rose 
ist Ed. That yellow Cheek of her's to' incarnadine. 

VII Come, fill the Cup, and in the Fire of Spring 

ist Ed. The "Winter Garment of Repentance fling: 

The Bird of Time has but a little way 
To fly — and Lo ! the Bird is on the Wing. 

IX And look — a thousand Blossoms with the Day 

ist Ed. Woke — and a thousand scatter'd into Clay: 

2d Ed. Morning a thousand Roses brings, you say ; 



Variations are numbered according to the quatrains of the Fourth Edition. 

52 



VARIATIONS IN THE TEXT 



X But come with old Khayyam, and leave the Lot 
i st Ed. Of Kaikobad and Kaikhosru forgot ! 

Let Rustum lay about him as he will, 

Or Hatim Tai cry Supper — heed them not. 

2d Ed. Let Rustum cry " To Battle ! " as he likes, 

Or Hatim Tai " To Supper ! " heed not you. 

3d Ed. Let Zal and Rustum thunder as they will, 

XI With me along some Strip of Herbage strown 
1st Ed. That just divides the desert from the sown, 

Where name of Slave and Sultan scarce is known, 
And pity Sultan Mahmud on his Throne. 

XII Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough, 
1st Ed. A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse — and Thou 

Beside me singing in the Wilderness — 
And Wilderness is Paradise enow. 

2d Ed. Here with a little Bread beneath the Bough, 

XIII "How sweet is mortal Sovranty ! " — think some: 

1st Ed. Others — "How blest the Paradise to come!" 

Ah, take the Cash in hand and waive the Rest; 
Oh, the brave Music of a distant Drum ! 

2d Ed. Ah, take the Cash, and let the Promise go, 

Nor heed the music of a distant Drum ! 

XIV Look to the Rose that blows about us — " Lo," 

1st Ed. 

XVI Lighting a little hour or two — was gone. 

2d Ed. 

XVII Think, in this batter'd Caravanserai 

1st Ed. Whose Doorways are alternate Night and Day, 

How Sultan after Sultan with his Pomp 
Abode his Hour or two, and went his way. 

53 



RUBAlYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XVIII 

ist Ed. 

XIX 

ist Ed. 

XX 

ist Ed. 

2d Ed. 

XXI 

ist Ed. 

XXII 

ist Ed. 

XXIII 

ist Ed. 

XXV 

ist Ed. 



Stamps o'er his Head, and he lies fast asleep. 

Dropt in its Lap from some once lovely Head. 

And this delightful Herb whose tender Green 
Fledges the River's Lip on which we lean — 

And this delightful Herb whose living Green 

" To-morrow ? " for " To-morro*w I " 

Lo! some we loved, the loveliest and best 
That Time and Fate of all their Vintage prest, 

" Bloom," for " bloom." 

And those that after a To-MORROW stare, 



XXVI Of the Two Worlds so learnedly, are thrust 
ist & 2d Eds. 

XXVII Came out by the same Door as in I went, 
ist & 2d Eds. 

XXVIII And with my own hand labour'd it to grow: 
ist Ed. 

2d & 3d Eds. And with my own hand wrought to make it grow: 

XXX Another and another Cup to drown 

ist Ed. The Memory of this Impertinence ! 

2d Ed. Ah, contrite Heav'n endowed us with the Vine 

To drug the memory of that insolence ! 

54 



VARIATIONS IN THE TEXT 



XXXI And many Knots unravel'd by the Road; 

ist Ed. But not the Knot of Human Death and Fate. 

2d Ed. And many Knots unravel'd by the Road ; 

XXXII There was a Door to which I found no Key : 
ist Ed. There was a Veil past which I could not see : 

Some little Talk awhile of Me AND Thee 

There seem'd — and then no more of THEE AND ME. 

XXXIV Then to the rolling Heav'n itself I cried, 
ist Ed. Asking, «' What Lamp had Destiny to guide 

Her little Children stumbling in the Dark ? " 
And — " A blind Understanding ! " Heav'n replied. 



2d Ed. Then of the Thee in Me who works behind 

The Veil of Universe I cried to find 
A Lamp to guide me through the darkness ; and 
Something then said — "An Understanding blind." 

XXXV Then to this earthen Bowl did I adjourn 
ist Ed. My Lip the secret Well of Life to learn : 

2d Ed. I lean'd, the secret Well of Life to learn : 

XXXVI I think the Vessel, that with fugitive 
ist Ed. Articulation answer'd, once did live, 

And merry-make ; and the cold Lip I kiss'd 
How many Kisses might it take — and give! 

2d Ed. And that impassive Lip I kiss'd 

XXXVII For in the Market-place, one Dusk of Day, 
ist Ed. I watch'd the Potter thumping his wet Clay : 

XXXVIII Listen — a moment listen! Of the same 

3d Ed. Poor Earth from which that Human Whisper came, 

The luckless Mould in which Mankind was cast 
They did compose, and call'd him by the name. 

55 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XXXIX And not a drop that from our Cups we throw 
2d Ed. On the parcht herbage but may steal below 

XL As then the Tulip for her wonted sup 

2d Ed. Of Heavenly Vintage lifts her chalice up, 

Do you, twin offspring of the soil, till Heav'n 
To Earth invert you like an empty Cup. 

XLI Oh, plagued no more with Human or Divine, 

2d Ed. To-morrow's tangle to itself resign, 

XLJI And if the Wine you drink, the Lip you press, 

i st Ed. End in the Nothing all Things end in — Yes — 

Then fancy while Thou art, Thou art but what 
Thou shalt be — Nothing — Thou shalt not be less. 

2d Ed. And if the Cup you drink, the Lip you press, 

End in what All begins and ends in — Yes; 
Imagine then you are what heretofore 
You Tvere — hereafter you shall not be less. 

XLIII While the Rose blows along the River Brink, 

ist Ed. With old Khayyam the Ruby Vintage drink : 

And when the Angel with his darker Draught 
Draws up to Thee — take that, and do not shrink. 

2d Ed. So when at last the Angel of the drink 

Of Darkness finds you by the river-brink, 
And, proffering his Cup, invites your Soul 
Forth to your Lips to quaff it — do not shrink. 

XLIV Oh, if my Soul can fling his Dust aside, 

From And naked on the Air of Heaven ride, 

Preface to Is »t not a Shame, is 't not a Shame for Him 

ist Ed. So long in this Clay Suburb to abide ! 



2d Ed. 



Is 't not a shame — is 't not a shame for him 
So long in this Clay Suburb to abide! 

56 



VARIATIONS IN THE TEXT 



XLV Or is that but a Tent, where rests anon 

From A Sultan to his Kingdom passing on, 

Preface to And which the swarthy Chamberlain shall strike 

ist Ed. Then when the Sultan rises to be gone ? 

2d Ed. But that is but a Tent wherein may rest 

XLVI And fear not lest Existence closing your 

2d Ed. Account, should lose, or know the type no more ; 

XLVII As much as Ocean of a pebble-cast. 

2d Ed. 

3d Ed. As the Sev'n Seas should heed a pebble-cast. 

XLVIII One Moment in Annihilation's Waste, 
ist Ed. One Moment, of the Well of Life to taste — 

The Stars are setting and the Caravan 
Starts for the Dawn of Nothing — Oh make haste! 

2d Ed. Draws to the Dawn of Nothing — Oh, make haste! 

XLIX A Hair, they say, divides the False and True — 

2d Ed. And upon what, prithee, does Life depend ? 

LII "Does," instead of "doth." 
2d & 3d Eds. 

LIV How long, how long, in infinite Pursuit 

ist Ed. Of This and That endeavour and dispute ? 

Better be merry with the fruitful Grape 
Than sadden after none, or bitter, Fruit. 

LV You know, my Friends, how long since in my House 

ist Ed. For a new Marriage I did make Carouse : 

2d Ed. You know, my Friends, how bravely in my House 

LVI For " IS and Is-NOT " though with Rule and Line, 

ist Ed. And " Up-AND-DOWN " without, I could define, 

I yet in all I only cared to know, 
Was never deep in anything but — Wine. 

57 



RUBAlYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LrVII Ah, fill the Cup : — what boots it to repeat 

i st Ed. How Time is slipping underneath our Feet : 

Unborn To-MORROW and dead YESTERDAY, 
Why fret about them if TO-DAY be sweet ! 



2d Ed. 



LVIII 

ist Ed. 

LIX 

ist Ed. 

LX 
ist Ed. 



LXII 

2d Ed. 
LXIII 
ist Ed. 

2d Ed. 



Ah, but my Computations, People say, 

Have squared the Year to Human Compass, eh? 

If so, by striking from the Calendar 

Unborn To-morrow and dead Yesterday. 

Stealing " for " shining." 



"Subtle" for "sovereign." 

The mighty Mahmud, the victorious Lord, 
That all the misbelieving and black Horde 
Of Fears and Sorrows that infest the Soul 
Scatters and slays with his enchanted Sword. 

When the frail Cup is crumbled into Dust! 

Oh, come with old Khayyam, and leave the Wise 
To talk; one thing is certain, that Life flies; 

"Is blown" for "has blown." 
" Fellows " for " comrades." 



LXV 

2d & 3d Eds. 

LXVI And after many days my Soul return'd 

2d Ed. And said, " Behold, Myself am Heav'n and Hell : 

LXVII And Hell the Shadow of a Soul op fire, 
2d & 3d Eds. 

LXVIII For in and out, above, about, below, 
ist Ed. 'T is nothing but a Magic Shadow-show, 

Play'd in a Box whose Candle is the Sun, 
Round which we Phantom Figures come and go. 

58 



VARIATIONS IN THE TEXT 



2d Ed. Of visionary Shapes that come and go 

Round with this Sun-illumin'd Lantern held 

LXIX 'Tis all a Chequer-board of Nights and Days 

ist Ed. Where Destiny with Men for Pieces plays: 

Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays, 
And one by one back in the Closet lays. 

2d & 3d Eds. Impotent Pieces of the Game He plays 

LXX The Ball no Question makes of Ayes and Noes, 

ist Ed. But Right or Left, as strikes the Player goes ; 

And He that toss'd Thee down into the Field, 
He knows about it all — He knows — HE knows! 

2d & 3d Eds. The same, with the substitution of "you" for "Thee" 
in third line. 

LXXI "Thy" for "your" in second and fourth lines, 

ist Ed. 

LXXII And that inverted Bowl we call The Sky, 

ist Ed. Whereunder crawling coop't we live and die, 

Lift not thy hands to // for help — for It 

Rolls impotently on as Thou or I. 

2d & 3d Eds. As impotently rolls as you or I. 

LXXIII With Earth's first Clay They did the Last Man's knead, 
ist Ed. And then of the Last Harvest sow'd the Seed : 

Yea, the first Morning of Creation wrote 
What the Last Dawn of Reckoning shall read. 

LXX V I tell Thee this — When, starting from the Goal, 
ist Ed. Over the shoulders of the flaming Foal, etc. 

LXXVI The Vine had struck a Fibre; which about 
ist Ed. If clings my Being— let the Sufi flout; 

59 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LXXVII And this I know: whether the one True Light, 
ist Ed. Kindle to Love, or Wrathconsume me quite, 

One Glimpse of It within the Tavern caught 
Better than in the Temple lost outright. 

LXXIX Pure Gold for what he lent us dross-allay'd — 
2d & 3d Eds. Sue for a Debt we never did contract, 

LXXX Thou wilt not with Predestination round 

1 st Ed. Enmesh me, and impute my Fall to Sin ? 

LXXXI And who with Eden didst devise the Snake; 
ist Ed. 

2d Ed. For all the Sin the Face of wretched Man 

Is black with — Man's Forgiveness give — and take ! 

LXXXII Listen again. One Evening at the Close 
ist Ed. Of Ramazan, ere the better Moon arose, 

In that old Potter's Shop I stood alone 
With the clay Population round in Rows. 

LXXXIII And once again there gather'd a scarce heard 
2d Ed. Whisper among them ; as it were, the stirr'd 

Ashes of some all but extinguisht Tongue, 
Which mine ear kindled into living Word. 

LXXXIV Then said another — " Surely not in vain 
ist Ed. My Substance from the common Earth was ta'en, 

That He who subtly wrought me into Shape 
Should stamp me back to common Earth again." 

2d Ed. " Should stamp me back to shapeless Earth again ? ,: 

LXXX V Another said — " Why, ne'er a peevish Boy, 
ist Ed. Would break the Bowl from which he drank in Joy; 

Shall He that ma.de the Vessel in pure Love 
And Fansy, in an after Rage destroy! 
60 



VARIATIONS IN THE TEXT 



2d Ed. Another said — " Why, ne'er a peevish Boy- 

Would break the Cup from which he drank in Joy; 
Shall He that of his own free Fancy made 
The Vessel, in an after-rage destroy ! " 

LXXXVI None answer'd this; but after Silence spake 
ist Ed, A Vessel of a more ungainly Make : 

LXXXVII And, strange to tell, among that Earthen Lot 
ist Ed. Some could articulate, while others not : 

And suddenly one more impatient cried — 

" Who is the Potter, pray, and who the Pot ? " 

2d Ed. Thus with the Dead as with the Living, What ? 

And Why? so ready, but the Wherefor not, 
One on a sudden peevishly exclaim'd, 
"Which is the Potter, pray, and which the Pot?" 

LXXXVIII Said one— "Folks of a surly Tapster tell, 

ist Ed. And daub his Visage with the Smoke of Hell; 

They talk of some strict Testing of us — Pish ! 

He's a Good Fellow, and 'twill all be well." 

2d Ed. Said one — " Folks of a surly Master tell, 

And daub his Visage with the Smoke of Hell; 
They talk of some sharp Trial of us — Pish ! 

LXXXIX Then said another with a long-drawn Sigh, 
ist Ed. 

2d Ed. " Well," said another, " Whoso will, let try," 

XC One spied the little Crescent all were seeking : 

ist Ed. 

" Hark to the Porter's Shoulder-knot a-creaking ! " 

2d & 3d Eds. (As the above, excepting the fourth line) 

"Now for the Porter's shoulder-knot a-creaking!" 
61 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XCI Ah, with the Grape my fading Life provide, 

i st Ed. And wash my Body whence the Life has died, 

And in a Windingsheet of Vine-leaf wrapt, 
So bury me by some sweet Garden-side. 

XCII That ev'n my buried Ashes such a Snare 

ist Ed. Of Perfume shall fling up into the Air, 

As not a True Believer passing by 

But shall be overtaken unaware. 

XCIII Indeed the Idols I have loved so long 

ist Ed. Have done my Credit in Men's Eye much wrong 

Have drown'd my Honour in a shallow Cup, 
And sold my Reputation for a Song. 

2d & 3d Eds. Have done my credit in Men's eye much wrong: 

XCV I often wonder what the Vintners buy 

ist Ed. One half so precious as the Goods they sell. 

2d Ed. I often wonder what the Vintners buy 

One half so precious as the ware they sell. 



XCVI 
ist Ed. 

XCVII 
2d Ed. 



Alas, that Spring should vanish with the Rose ! 
That Youth's sweet-scented Manuscript should close! 

Toward which the fainting Traveller might spring, 



XCVIII 

2d Ed. 



XCIX 

ist Ed. 



Oh if the World were but to re-create, 

That we might catch ere closed the Book of Fate, 

And make The Writer on a fairer leaf 

Inscribe our names, or quite obliterate ! 

Ah Love ! could thou and I with Fate conspire 



2d Ed. Ah Love ! could you and I with Fate conspire 

62 



VARIATIONS IN THE TEXT 



C Ah, Moon of my Delight who know'st no wane, 

ist Ed. The Moon of Heav'n is rising once again : 

How oft hereafter rising shall she look 
Through this same Garden after me — in vain! 

2d Ed. But see ! The rising Moon of Heav'n again 

Looks for us, Sweet-heart, through the quivering Plane 
How oft hereafter rising will she look 
Among those leaves — for one of us in vain! 

CI And when Thyself with shining Foot shall pass 

ist Ed. Among the Guests Star-scatter'd on the Grass, 

And in thy joyous Errand reach the Spot 
Where I made one — turn down an empty Glass! 

2d & 3d Eds. And when Yourself with silver Foot shall pass 

3d Ed. And in your blissful errand reach the spot 



<T 



QUATRAINS PRINTED IN 
THE SECOND EDITION ONLY 

XIV 
Were it not Folly, Spider-like to spin 
The Thread of present Life away to win — 
What ? for ourselves, who know not if we shall 
Breathe out the very Breath we now breathe in! 

XX 

The Palace that to Heav'n his pillars threw, 

The Kings the forehead on his threshold drew — 

I saw the solitary Ringdove there, 

And "Coo, coo, coo," she cried; and "Coo, coo, coo." 

63 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



xxvm 
Another Voice, when I am sleeping, cries, 
" The Flower should open with the Morning skies.' 
And a retreating Whisper, as I wake — 
" The Flower that once has blown forever dies." 

xuv 

Do you, within your little hour of Grace, 
The waving Cypress in your Arms enlace, 
Before the Mother back into her arms 
Fold, and dissolve you in a last embrace. 

LXV 
If but the Vine and Love-abjuring Band 
Are in the Prophet's Paradise to stand, 
Alack, I doubt the Prophet's Paradise 
Were empty as the hollow of one's Hand. 

LXXVII 
For let Philosopher and Doctor preach 
Of what they will and what they will not — each 
Is but one Link in an eternal Chain 
That none can slip, nor break, nor over-reach. 

LXXXVI 
Nay, but, for terror of his wrathful Face, 
I swear I will not call Injustice Grace ; 
Not one Good Fellow of the Tavern but 
Would kick so poor a Coward from the place. 

XCi 
And once again there gather'd a scarce heard 
Whisper among them ; as it were, the stirr'd 
Ashes of some all but extinguisht Tongue, 
Which mine ear kindled into living Word. 



1 In the Third and Fourth Editions, Quatrain LXXXIII. takes the place of this. 

64 



VARIATIONS IN THE TEXT 



xcrx 
Whither resorting from the vernal Heat 
Shall Old Acquaintance Old Acquaintance greet, 
Under the Branch that leans above the Wall 
To shed his Blossom over head and feet. 

CVII 
Better, oh better, cancel from the Scroll 
Of Universe one luckless Human Soul, 
Than drop by drop enlarge the Flood that rolls 
Hoarser with Anguish as the Ages roll. 



65 



The Ruba iyat of 
Omar Khayyam 

Translated into English Prose by 

Justin Huntly McCarthy 



OMAR KHAYYAM 

<By JUSTIN HUNTLY SMcCARTHY 



S~\MAR, dear Sultan of the Persian Song, 
\^Jr Familiar Friend whom I have loved so long, 

Whose Volume made my pleasant Hiding-place 
From this fantastic World of Right and Wrong* 

My Youth lies buried in thy Verses : lo, 
I read, and as the haunted Numbers flow, 

My Memory turns in anguish to the Face 
That leaned o'er Omar's pages long ago* 

Alas for cMe, alas for all who weep 
And wonder at the Silence dark and deep 

That girdles round this little Lamp in space 
No wiser than when Omar fell asleep* 

Rest in thy Grave beneath the crimson rain 
Of heart-desired Roses* Life is vain, 

And vain the trembling Legends we may trace 
Upon the open Booh that shuts again* 



69 



The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam 



I 

SINCE it is the fate of man upon this hateful earth to feed on 
sorrow and to vex his soul, he must be accounted happy who 
departs swiftly from the world, but he most happy who never 
comes into the world. 

II 

The secret of Eternity is far from thee and me ; the word of the 
enigma is unknown to thee and me ; behind the veil is speech of thee 
and me ; but if the veil be rent, what haps to thee and me ? 

Ill 

Without clear wine I cannot live ; without the wine-cup I cannot 
lift the load of life ; I am the slave of that fair hour when the cup- 
bearer bids me drain yet another cup and I cannot. 

IV 
The rose said, " I am the Yusuf flower, for my mouth is full of 
gold and jewels." I said, " If thou art the Yusuf flower, show me a 
certain sign thereof." And she made answer, " Perchance that I am 
garbed in a blood-drenched garment." 

V 
Long time I sought in this shifting world for a moment's halting- 
place. I spent in my endeavours all my wit, and lo ! I learn that 
the moon is but a pallid wheel beside thy beauty, that the cypress, 
by thy slender form, seems a grotesque deformity. 

VI 
Yea, drink wine, for by him who is far-seeing as I am, it will be 
found that in the eyes of the Deity the act is of small account. God 
from all time has foreseen that I should drink wine. If I drank not, 
this fore-knowledge would become ignorance, or I should not fulfil 
His fore-knowledge. 

7* 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



VII 
Rise and come hither, and for mine heart's ease solve at least one 
problem : bring swiftly here a flask of ancient wine, that we may 
drink our fill before folk make flagons of our clay. 

vni 

"When I am dead, wash me with vintage juice ; instead of prayers 
recite over my tomb hymnals of wine and flagons, and if you seek me 
at the latter day, look for me in the dust upon the tavern threshold. 



IX 

Since no man dares play prophet for to-morrow, hasten to lift thy 
heavy laden heart. Drain, O delightful moon, a crimson cup, for 
Heaven's moon will turn a weary while and fail to find us. 



Let the lucky lover be drunk from year's end to year's end, 
drenched in wine and garbed in shame ; for when we are wise and 
wide-awake sorrow assaults us from all quarters, but no sooner are 
we drunk than we laugh at fortune. 

XI 

In Heaven's name, why does the philosopher set his heart upon 
the trophies of this house of many sorrows ? Let him who calls me 
drunkard clear his eyes and tell me if he sees on high even the sign 
of a tavern. 

XII 

Every morn I say, this shall be the night of repentance, repent- 
ance from the flagon, and from the bowl brimming over, repentance. 
Yet now that the season of roses has come set me free in the time of 
the rose from repentance, O Lord of repentance ! 

72 



McCarthy version 



xiii 
Speak sooth, thou Little Wheel, what have I done to thee, that 
thus, beaten and persecuted, I should be driven by thee to beg my 
bread from town to town and find my draught in the flowing stream ? 

XIV 

I passed by where a potter kneaded earth and I beheld what he 
did not behold, that it was my father's dust which lay in the palm of 
that potter. 

XV 
Man is like unto a flagon and his soul is the wine therein: his 
mould is like unto a reed, and his soul is the sound therein. What 
is earthly man, O Khayyam, but a paper lantern of fancy and a lamp 
therein. 

XVI 

Since life seldom answers to our heart's desire, of what avail are 
all our hopes and all our strivings ? Our spirits are always vexed, 
always are we saying in sighing, " Too late we came, too soon we 
must depart." 

XVII 
Since the Heavenly Wheel and Fate have never been your friends, 
why should you reck whether the Heavens be seven or eight ? There 
are, I say again, two days for which I take no thought, the day which 
has not come, and the day which has gone for ever. 



xvni 
O Khayyam, why so much mourning for your sin ? What conso- 
lation can you find in thus plaguing yourself ? He who has never 
sinned can never taste the sweet of forgiveness. Mercy was made 
for the sake of sin, therefore why are you afraid ? 

73 



RUBAlYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XIX 
No one has ever passed behind the veil that masks the secrets of 
God. No one shall ever pass behind it ; there is no other dwelling- 
place for us than the bosom of the earth. Woe 's me that this 
secret, too, should be so short. 



I myself will pour wine into a cup which containeth a full measure. 
Two cups thereof will content me, but I will immediately three times 
divorce from me religion and reason, and wed the daughter of the 
vine. 

XXI 
Oh, my beloved, full of graces and witcheries, seat thyself; and 
thus, quenching the flames of a thousand desires rise not up again. 
Thou forbiddest me to gaze upon thee, but thou might as well com- 
mand me to turn down the cup, without spilling the contents thereof. 



Seek the company of men of righteousness and understanding, 
and fly a thousand leagues from a man without wit. If a wise man 
giveth thee poison, fear not to drink thereof, but if a fool offereth 
thee an antidote, pour it out upon the earth. 

xxm 
My well beloved, may her days be long as my sorrows, is kind to 
me again. She cast upon me a sweet and fleeting glance, and 
straightway vanished, saying, no doubt, " Let me do good and cast it 
on the water." 

XXIV 
The Koran, which men call the Holy Word, is none the less read 
only from time to time, and not with steadfast study, while on the 
lip of the cup there runs a luminous verse which we love to read 
always and ever. 

74 



McCarthy version 



XXV 
You who drink no wine, blame not the bibbers, for I would liefer 
renounce Heaven than renounce the juice of the grape. You plume 
yourself upon your temperance, but this false glory sits vilely on 
one who commits deeds a thousand times more vile than honest 
drunkenness. 

XXVI 

Although my body may be comely, although its odour may be 
suave, although my colour may mock the tulip, and my figure shame 
the cypress, it is not clear to me, nevertheless, why my Heavenly 
painter has deigned to limn me on this world. 

xxvn 
* v I wish to drink so deep, so deep of wine that its fragrance may 
hang about the soil where I shall sleep, and that revellers, still dizzy 
from last night's wassail, shall, on visiting my tomb, from its very 
perfume fall dead drunk. 

XXVJLLL 
In the kingdom of hope win all the hearts you can, in the kingdom 
of the presence, bind to thyself a perfect soul, for, be sure, a hundred 
Kaabas, blent of earth and water, are not worth a single heart. Give 
then thy Kaaba the go-by, and seek a heart instead. 



Oh, wheel of fate, destruction falls from thy unconquerable hate. 
Tyranny has been thy purpose and thy pleasure from the beginning 
of things. And thou too, O earth, if we but digged into thy breast, 
what treasures should we not find therein ! 

XXX 

When our blood beats quickest with joy of the green earth, when 
the steeds of the sun sweep over the green earth, I love to wander 
with lovely girls upon the green earth, making merry together before 
we are all turned to green earth. 

75 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



Every day when dawn appears, I will hasten to the tavern with 
the cheating kalendars. 1 Then, thou that art Lord of the deepest 
secrets of man's heart, give me faith, if thou wouldest that I put 
faith in prayer. 

xxxii 
Never, alas, do we drink with delight one drop of clear water 
without at the same time draining the bowl of bitter wine from the 
hand of sorrow. Never do we sharpen the savour of bread with the 
savour of salt without feeding upon our own hearts. 

xxxm 

Take a grip of the Koran with one hand ; have a clutch at the cup 
with the other, and tremble between the lawful and the unlawful. 
So shall we sit beneath the vaulted sky neither wholly believers nor 
wholly infidel. 



"We should keep all our secrets from the indiscreet, from the very 
nightingale we should hide them. Think then, O Heaven, upon the 
harm you wreak upon poor human hearts in forcing them thus to 
hide from each other's eyes. 



O Cup-Bearer, since Time lurks hard by ready to shatter you and 
me, this world can never be an abiding dwelling for you and me. 
But come what may, assure yourself that God is in our hands while 
this cup of wine stands between you and me. 

XXXVI 

With cup in hand I lingered long among the flowers, and yet not 
one of all my wishes has been realized in this world. But although 
wine has not led me to the goal of my desires, I will not go from that 
way, for when man follows a road he turns not back again. 



1 " Kalendars" — Sufi dervishes. 

76 



McCarthy version 



mrx vir 

Place the wine-cup in my hand, for my heart is all afire and life 
slips from us swift as quicksilver. Arise, my beloved, for the favour 
of fortune is but a cheating dream, arise, for the flame of youth 
gushes like the water of the torrent. 

XXXVIII 
We are the servants of love ; the devout are otherwise. We are 
poor ants, and Solomon is otherwise. Ask of us a visage wan with 
love, and tattered garments for the way of the world is otherwise. 



Ascribe not to the wheel of heaven the woe and weal which are 
the portion of man, the thousand joys and thousand sorrows which 
Fate awards us, for this wheel, my friend, revolves more helpless 
than thyself along the highway of the heavenly love. 

XL 
I have flown like a sparrow-hawk forth from this world of mys- 
teries, in the hope of reaching a higher sphere. But, fallen again to 
the earth, and finding none worthy of sharing the hidden thoughts of 
my heart, I have gone forth again by the door through which I came. 

XLI 

We are lost in love to-day, in the holy shrine we pay homage to 
wine to-day, sundered from our very being we shall touch the 
threshold of the eternal throne to-day. 

XLH 

The day when I hold in my hand a cup of wine, and when in the 
joy of my heart I drink myself drunk, then in that happy state a 
hundred miracles become clear to me, and words as limpid as water 
explain the mystery of things. 

77 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XLHI 

Since every day is but two halting places, hasten to drink thy fill 
of wine; for be sure of this, thou wilt never regain thy lost hours, 
and since thou knowest that this world drives swiftly to its total ruin, 
imitate it thyself, and day and night seek the sweet annihilation of 
wine. 

XLIV 
Behold the dawn arise, O fountain of delights. Drink your wine 
and touch your lute, for the life of those who sleep will be but brief ; 
and of those who have gone hence, not one will e'er return. 

XLV 
Yea, it is I, who, in this ruined tavern, surrounded by drinkers 
and dancers, have staked, for their sakes, all my belongings, soul 
and heart, and worldly gear, down to my very drinking cup. Thus I 
set myself free from hope of Heaven and from fear of Hell. Thus I 
am above the elements, earth, air, fire, and water. 

XLVI 
Only a breath divides faith and unfaith, only a breath divides belief 
from doubt. Let us then make merry while we still draw breath, for 
only a breath divides life from death. 

XLVII 
The light of the moon has severed the black robe of the night. 
Drink wine, therefore, for thou wilt never find a moment so precious. 
Yes, give thyself up to joy, for this same moon will illumine long 
after us the face of the earth. 

XLvni 
The clouds are spread forth again over the faces of the roses, and 
cover them as with a veil. The desire of drink is still unquenched 
within my heart. Seek not yet thy couch, for the time has not come. 
Oh, beloved of my soul, drink wine, drink, for the sun has not yet 
vanished beneath the horizon. 

7 8 



f 



McCarthy version 



XLIX 

Thou who knowest man's most hidden thoughts, Thou who up- 
holdest the halt with Thy hands, give me strength to renounce, and 
heed my pleading, O Thou who art the strength of all men, heed my 
pleading. 

L 

1 saw upon the walls of Thous a bird perched in front of the skull 
of Kai Khosrou. The bird said unto the skull, " Alas, what has 
become of the clash of the gear of thy glory and the bruit of thy 
trumpets ? " 

LI 

My run of life slips by in a few days. It has passed me by like 
the wind of the desert. Therefore, so long as one breath of life is 
left to me, there are two days with which I shall never vex my spirit, 
the day that has not yet come, and the day that has gone by. 

ui 

This captain ruby comes from an unknown mine. This perfect 
gem is stamped with an unknown seal. All our conclusions on the 
question are vain, for the riddle of perfect love is written in an 
unknown tongue. 

LHI 

Since the day brings with it a consciousness of youth, I mean to 
wile it away with wine even to my heart's delight. Do not blas- 
pheme, on account of its bitterness, this glorious juice, for it is a 
delight to drink, and bitter only because it is my life. 

LIV 

O, my sad soul, since it is your destiny to be pierced to the quick 
by sorrow, since nature bids that you shall be troubled every day with 
a new torment, therefore, O my soul, tell me why you took up your 
abode in my body, seeing that you must one day quit it. 

79 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LV 

On that day of days which men call restful, set aside the cup and 
drink your wine from a larger measure. If you pledge other days 
with but a single draught, this day drink twice, for it is indeed the 
day of days. 

LVI 

Him, on whom you lean with so much confidence, him, if your 
eyes were unsealed, you would know for your worst enemy. It is 
wise in these evil days to seek but little after friendship. The speech 
of our fellows rings fair only from afar. 

LVII 
Oh, my heart, since this world grieves thee, since thy pure soul 
must so soon be severed from thy body, sit thee down in the grassy 
fields and make merry awhile, before other grasses spring from the 
very dust. 

LVIII 
Although this wine in its essence is capable of taking a thousand 
shapes, assuming now the form of an animal, now the form of a plant, 
do not therefore believe that it can ever cease to be, and that its 
essence can be destroyed, for there is the reality when the shadows 
disappear. 

LIX 

I see no smoke arise from the fire of my sins ; I expect a fairer 
fate from no man. If the injustice of men makes me lift my hand to 
my head, I find no solace in laying it on the hem of their gaberdines. 

LX 
Let us begin again the round of our pleasures ; let us continue to 
disdain the round of prayers. Wherever the wine-flagon is to be 
found, there also thou mayest see, like unto the neck of the flagon 
itself, our throats stretched out to the cup. 

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L3 
Here, below, we are naught but puppets tor the diversion of the 
wheel of the heavens. This is indeed a truth, and no simile. We 
truly are but pieces on this chessboard of humanity, which in the end 
we leave, only to enter, one by one, into the grave of nothingness. 

LXII 
In mosque, in school, in church, in synagogue, men fear for hell 
and hope for paradise, but the seed of this uncertainty has never 
sprouted in the soul of him who has penetrated the secrets of the 
All-Wise. 

LXIH 

Thou askest me the meaning of this phantasmagoria of things 
here below. To expound the whole of it to thee would be a work 
without end. It is a fantastic vision, which springs from a boundless 
ocean, and sinks again into the same ocean from which it arose. 

LXIV 
Let us abandon the vain search after the unattainable, and give 
ourselves up wholly to the joys of the present, to touching the long 
tresses trembling to the melodious sound of the harp. 

LXV 
We yield ourselves to the commands of wine, joyously we offer 
our souls in sacrifice to the smiling stream of the holy juice. Behold 
our minister of wine, in one hand the flagon, in the other the brim- 
ming cup, bidding us quaff the purest wine of his soul. 

LXVI 
You have wandered upon the face of the earth, but all that you 
have known is nothing, all that you have seen, all that you have 
heard, is nothing. Though you travel from world's end to world's 
end, all that is nothing, although you abide in a corner of your house, 
all that is nothing. 

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RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



lxvii 
One night I beheld in a dream a sage, who said to me, " In sleep, 
O my friend, the rose of joy has never blossomed for any man. 
Why do you do a deed so like to death ? Arise, and drink wine, for 
you will sleep sound enough beneath the earth." 

LXVIII 
Fling dust to the skies, and drink deep of the wine-flagon ; seek 
ever the fairest women. ' it end dost thou sue for pardon, to 

what end dost thou pray, seeing that of all those departed hence, 
not one has returned ? 

LXIX 
If the human heart could know the secrets of life, it would know 
too, knowing death, the secrets of God. If to-day, when you are with 
yourself, you know nothing, what shall you know to-morrow, when 
you have passed from yourself? 

LXX 
Though heaven and earth were blent together, though all the lustre 
of the stars went out, I would wait in your path, O beloved, and ask 
of you why you have taken away my life. 

LXXI 
Thank God, the hour of roses has arrived. From my heart I 
delight in the thought of breaking the law of Alkoran. For many a 
day I mean to delight me with girls of lovely face and lovely body, 
and to turn the meadow to a tulip-bed by the spilth of my wine on 
the green sward. 

Lxxn 

Although, truly, I have never pierced the pearl of obedience which 
we owe to Thee, although I have never swept the dust of Thy steps 
from my heart, I do not despair of reaching to the foot of the throne 
of Thy mercy, for I have never worried Thee with my importunate 
prayers. 

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Lxxin 

This jar has been, like me, a creature, loving and unhappy ; it has 
sighed for the long tresses of some fair young girl ; that handle by 
• /hich you hold it now, was once a loving arm to linger fondly round 
.ome fair one's neck. 

lxxiv 
Do not heedlessly beat at every portal. We must learn to take 
the good with the bad in this life, for we can only play the game 
according to the number of dots on the face of the dice which destiny 
throws into the hollow of this heavenly cup. 

LXXV 
Before ever you or I were born, there were dawns and twilights, 
and it was not without design that the revolutions of the skies were 
sanctioned. Be careful, then, how you tread upon this dust, for it 
was once, no doubt, the apple of some fair girl's eye. 

LXXVT 

You cannot assure yourself to-day that you shall behold to-mor- 
row's dawn ; even to dwell upon to-morrow is mere madness ; if your 
heart is wide awake, do not waste in torpor this little pinch of life, for 
there is no proof how long it shall abide with you. 

LXXVn 
Question me not upon the vagaries of this world, nor of the things 
that yet may be. Look upon this present hour as plunder from des- 
tiny. Vex not thyself about the past, nor plague me about the 
future. 

LXXVIII 
The temples of the gods and kaabas are places of praise, the chim- 
ing of bells is naught but a hymn raised in praise of the All-Potent. 
The pulpit, the church, the beads, the cross, are all but different 
symbols of the same homage to the same Lord. 

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RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LXXIX 
Let not the fear of things to be make sallow thy cheek, let not 
things present make thee blanch with fear. Enjoy, in this land of 
shadows, thy share of delight, and do not wait therefor until heaven's 
gifts are snatched away from you, 

LXXX 
No false money circulates with us. The broom has cleanly swept 
our happy home. An old man coming from the tavern said, counsel- 
ling me, " Drink, friend, drink wine, for many lives will follow yours 
during your long sleep." 

LXXXI 
These travellers have departed, and of them all, not one has 
returned to tell us of the hidden things concealed behind the veil. 
Oh, devout man, it is by a humble heart, and not by prayer, that the 
things which concern thy soul will be brought to a favourable issue, 
for prayer is of no avail to a man without sincerity and contrition. 

LXXXII 
If you will hearken I will give you good counsel. Do not don the 
cloak of hypocrisy for the love of God. Eternity is of all time, and 
this world is but of a moment. Do not, then, barter for a moment 
the empery of eternity. 

LXXXIII 
How long shall I vex you with mine ignorance ? My nothingness 
oppresses my heart. Even now I will bind my loins with the girdle 
of the priests. Wherefore ? Because I weary of my way of life. 

LXXXIV 
Thou hast planted in our hearts an irresistible desire, and at the 
same time Thou hast forbidden us to satisfy it. In what a strait dost 
thou find thyself, oh, unhappy man, between this law of thy nature, 
and this commandment ? It is as if thou wert ordered to turn down 
the cup, without spilling the contents thereof. 

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LXXXV 

Khayyam, when you are drunk be merry ; when you are with 
your mistress, be glad ; since the end of this world is nothingness, 
think that you are not, and while you are, be jocund. 

LXXXVI 

All things that be were long since marked upon the tablet of crea- 
tion. Heaven's pencil has naught to do with good or evil. God set 
on fate its necessary seal ; and all our efforts are but a vain striving. 

LXXXVII 

1 would rather in the tavern with thee pour out all the thoughts of 
my heart, than without thee go and make my prayer unto Heaven. 
This, truly, O Creator of all things present and to come, is my reli- 
gion ; whether Thou castest me into the flames, or makest me glad 
with the light of Thy countenance. 

LXXXVIII 
I cannot lightly disclose my secret to the bad and the good alike. 
I cannot amplify my simple thought. I behold a place that I cannot 
describe ; I hold a secret that I cannot reveal. 

LXXXIX 
In the face of the decrees of Providence, nothing succeeds save 
resignation. Among men nothing succeeds save counterfeit and 
hypocrisy. I have employed all the most skilful ruses that the 
human mind can scheme, but Fate has always overturned my 
projects. 

XC 

If a stranger serves you faithfully, think of him as close of kin. If 
one of your kin betray you, think of him as acting in error. If a 
poison cures you, call it an antidote ; if an antidote works you ill, call 
it a poison. 

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RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XCI 
Behold, the time is come, when the earth is about to clothe itself 
in verdure, when the blossoms breaking forth over the branches, 
make them become as the hand of Moses, when, as if quickened by 
the breath of Jesus, the plants spring from the earth, when at last 
the clouds open their eyes to weep. 

xcn 
Long have I sung the praise of wine and dwelt among the things 
of its service. May you be happy, my philosopher, in the belief that 
you have taken wisdom for your master, but learn, too, that that 
master is only my pupil. 

XCIII 
Give not thyself over to care and to grief in the hope of gaining 
yellow or white money in the end. Enjoy thyself with thy compan- 
ions, before thy warm breath becomes cold, for thy enemies will feast 
in thy room when thou art departed. 

XCIV 
Since it is certain that we must needs go hence, what is the use of 
being ? Why should we strive so eagerly after unattainable happi- 
ness ? Since for some unknown reason we may not abide here, were 
it not well to think a little upon our voyage to come ? Why should 
we be so heedless thereof ? 

XCV 
What heart does not bleed for your absence, what soul is not the 
servant of your enchanting charms ? For though you pay heed to no 
one, there is no one who does not pay heed to you. 

XCVI 
The world upbraids me as a debauchee, and yet I am not guilty. 
Ye holy men, look upon yourselves, and learn what ye truly are. 
You charge me with violation of the Holy Law, but I have committed 
no other sins than riot, drunkenness, and adultery. 

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XCVII 
My happiness is incomplete while I am sober. When I am drunk, 
blank ignorance overgrows my reason. There is a state between 
clear reason and intoxication. Ah, with what joy do I make myself 
the slave of that state, for therein lies life. 

XCVIII 
This world is but a hair's breadth in our wretched life. The soul 
but the faint trace of our blended tears and blood. Hell is but a 
shadow of the vain toils we take upon ourselves. Paradise is but 
the moment's rest we sometimes taste here. 

XCIX 
If you give yourself up to your passion, to your insatiable desire, 
I prophesy unto you that you will go hence as poor as a beggar. 
See rather what you are and whence you come, know what you are 
and learn whither you go. 



Who can believe that he who made the cup would dream of 
destroying it ? All those fair faces, all those lovely limbs, all those 
enchanting bodies, what love has made them, and what hate 
destroys them ? 

CI 

It is but thy drunkenness which makes thee dread death and fear 
nothingness ; for it is clear that from that nothingness the tree of 
immortality shall spring. Since my soul has been resuscitated by 
the breath of Jesus, eternal death has fled afar from me. 



CII 

Copy the tulip, that flames with' the new year ; take, like her, the 
cup in your hand, and drink at all advantage your wine with a light 
heart, in company with a youthful beauty with tulip cheeks. For 
yon blue wheel may like a whirlwind at any moment dash you down. 

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RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



cm 

One drop of wine is worth all the kingdoms of the earth : the tile 
which covers the jar is worth a thousand lives. The cloth with 
which we wipe the lips moistened with wine is truly more precious 
than a thousand pieces. 

CIV 

O, my friends, when I am sped, appoint a meeting and when ye 
have met together, be ye glad thereof, and when the cup-bearer holds 
in her hand a flagon of old wine, then think upon old Khayyam and 
drink to his memory. 

CV 
There is no shield to save you from the spear-cast of destiny. 
Glory, gold, silver, each avails not. The more I ponder on this world 
and its gear, the more I am assured that to be good is all ; the rest 
avails not. 

CVI 
I pity the heart that is not prompted to abstinence, for it is the 
daily prey of passions. Only the heart that is free from care can be 
truly happy ; aught in excess of that state is mere vexation. 

CVII 
How long wilt thou afflict thy soul with the failure of thy ambi- 
tions ? Trouble is the lot of those who are careful for the future. 
Pass thy life in joy, therefore, and give not thyself up to the cares of 
this world. Know that wine will in no wise increase the bitterness 
of thy woes. 

CVIII 

He who has the wisdom to keep his heart contented has lost no 
hour in sorrow ; he has either devoted himself to seeking the grace 
of God, or he has gained tranquillity of soul over the brimming 
wine-cup. 

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CIX 

To drink wine and to make merry, such is my scheme of life. To 
pay no heed to heretic or devotee, such is my creed. I asked the 
bride of all the human race, " What is thy marriage portion ?" and 
she answered, smiling, " My marriage portion lies in the joy of thy 
heart." 

CX 
Rejoice, therefore, for the time cometh quickly when all whom 
thou beholdest now shall be hidden in the earth. Drink, drink wine, 
and let not the cares of this world overwhelm you. Those who come 
after thee will too soon become a prey. 

CXI 
No day ever finds my soul free from amazement, no night ever 
finds my bosom free from the tears that trickle from my eyes. The 
unease that sways me forbids the cup of my head from brimming 
with wine. Alas, how shall an inverted cup be ever filled ? 

CXII 
When God built up my body out of clay, He knew beforehand the 
fruit of all my deeds. It is not in defiance of His will that I a sinner 
have sinned. Why then for me does nether hell await ? 

CXIII 
What time my being seemed to lean to prayer and fasting, I 
deemed for a moment that I was about to touch the goal of my 
desires; but, alas, a breath has sufficed to destroy the efficacy of my 
ablutions, and a half measure of wine has set my fasts aside. 

CXIV 
All my being is attracted by the sight of the fair faces dyed with 
the hue of the rose ; my heart delights to savour the cup of wine. 
Yea, I wish to enjoy the award of each of my members before those 
members fall again into the all from which they sprang. 

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RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



cxv 

Yesterday I visited the workshop of a potter : there I beheld two 
thousand pots, some speaking, and some holding their peace. Each 
one seemed to say to me, " Where is then the potter, where the 
buyer of pots, where the seller ? " 

cxvi 
I am worthy neither of heaven nor yet. of hell. God knows from 
what clay He fashioned me. I am as heretical as a dervish, as ill- 
favoured as a harlot. I have neither faith nor wealth, nor hope of 
paradise. 

CXVII 
Yesterday, passing drunken before the tavern door, I beheld an 
old man, full of wine, bearing a gourd upon his back. I spake to him 
and said, "Oh, old man, dost thou not fear God?" He answered 
me, " There is mercy with Him — go, therefore, and drink." 

CXVIII 
Wine, which is valued by the man of understanding, is for me the 
water of life. It is balm to my heart, and an elixir which renews 
the strength of my soul. Hath not God himself said : " The benefit 
of mankind is found in wine." 

cxrx 

Poor man, thy passion, like unto a watch-dog, gives forth hollow 
sounds. It masks the wiles of the fox, it seeks the sleep of the hare ; 
it blends in one the rage of the tiger with the hunger of the wolf. 

CXX 

Who led thee here this night to me, thus drenched with wine ? 
Who, lifting the light veil that covered thee, has guided thee to my 
threshold ? Who has swept thee away again more swiftly than the 
wind, to feed more fiercely the flame that burnt already brightly in 
thine absence ? 

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CXXI 

Every heart in which Heaven hath set the lamp of love, whether 
that heart incline to mosque or synagogue, if its name be written in 
the book of love, it is freed from the fear of hell and the hope of 
paradise. 

CXXII 
O you who out of all the world art dearest to my heart, more pre- 
cious than the soul which quickens me or than the eyes that light my 
path, there is nothing, oh my beloved, dearer than life, and yet you, 
ah, you are a hundred times more dear. 

CXXIII 

How fair are the green fringes of the living stream. Surely they 
sprang once from the lip of some celestial fair. Trample them not 
with scorn, for they spring from the dust of a tulip-tinted face. 

CXXIV 

We are enduring naught but cark and care in this world which 
offers us a fleeting harbourage. Alas, not one of all creation's rid- 
dles has been read to us, and we depart hence with sorry hearts. 

CXXV 
When the day arriveth, when, with my head thrown back, I fall at 
the feet of death, when the destroying angel shall have made me like 
unto a bird without feathers ; oh, then, see thou that of my dust a 
wine-flagon is formed — for who can say but that the odour of the 
wine may re-inform my clay ? 

CXXVI 

Master, make lawful but one alone of all our wishes. Hold your 
peace and guide us on the road to God. Truly we walk straightly, it 
is you who go astray. Heal your eyes and leave us to our peace. 

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RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CXXVII 
Since this vain world abideth not, I will occupy myself only with 
guile, I will give up my thoughts to pleasure and limpid wine. 
They say unto me, " Hath not God forbidden it ? " — He can truly 
never have given me this commandment, for if He had I could not 
obey it! 

CXXVIII 
When I draw near unto the gear of this world, I behold all man- 
kind seizing on the good things it contains without any merit of 
theirs, while to me, oh All-Powerful God, nothing is vouchsafed but 
the shipwreck of my hopes. 

CXXIX 

A mouthful of wine is worth more than the kingdom of Kai 
Khosrou ; it is more desirable than the throne of Kai Kobad or the 
empery of Thous. The sighs with which a lover disturbs the dawn 
are preferable to the howlings of sanctimonious hypocrites. 



cxxx 

If I do drink wine it is not for mine own selfish gratification, it is 
not for riot's sake or to hold aloof from religion and the virtues, no, 
it is but that I may escape for a moment from myself. No other 
purpose spurs me to drink and be drunken. 



CXXXI 
Folk say that there is a hell. This is a vain error, in which no 
trust should be placed, for if there were a hell for lovers and for bib- 
bers of wine, why heaven would be, from to-morrow morn, as empty 
as the hollow of my hand. 1 



quatrains printed in Second Edition only, lxv. 

Q2 



McCarthy version 



cxxxii 
If you have drunk wine faithfully all the week, do not hold your 
hand on the Sabbath ; for, by our holy faith, there is no difference 
between that day and another. Be thou the worshipper of the All- 
High and not a worshipper of the days of the week. 

CXXXIII 
Dear my God, You are merciful, and mercy is pity. Why then has 
the greatest sinner been shut off from paradise ? If You only pardon 
me because I have obeyed You, what mercy is that? It would be 
merciful to forgive me, sinner that I am. 

CXXXIV 
Put wisdom by, and take the cup in hand. Cease to perplex your- 
self about heaven and hell. Sell thy silken turban to buy wine with 
the price and have no fear. Pluck off that costly head-gear — con- 
tent thy head with a woollen cap. 

cxxxv 

They bid me drink no wine during this month, for this month is 
the Prophet's, nor yet in that month, for that is the month of God. 
Very well, leave those two months to God and His Prophet, and let 
us drink deep in the month of Ramazan, since that month is reserved 
to us. 

CXXXVI 
Although wine is forbidden, cease not to drink thereof. Drink, by 
morning and eventide, drink to the sound of song, and to the melody 
of the harp. When thou hast procured wine glowing like the ruby, 
pour one drop on the earth, and drink the rest. 

CXXXVII 
Name my merits one by one, take my defects by tens at a time. 
Pardon every sin for the love of God. Do not feed the fire of hate 
with the breath of passion, pardon us in the memory of the tomb of 
the Prophet of God. 

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RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CXXXVTII 
The multitude of creeds has divided mankind into seventy-two 
nations. Of all these doctrines I have chosen that of thy love. Of 
what meaning are the words : impiety, Islam, faith, sin ? Thou art 
my sole desire. Away from me all these vain pretences. 

CXXXIX 
Truly the wine in the cup is a shining life, in the body of the 
flagon it is a clear soul. No churlish fellow is worthy of my fellow- 
ship. Only the wine cup deserves to enter therein, for it is at the 
same time a solid and a diaphanous body. 

CXL 

This aged caravanserai which men call the world, this alternating 
home of light and night, is but the fag end of a feast of a hundred 
such lords as Jamshid. It is but a tomb serving as a pillow for the 
sleep of a hundred such kings as Bahram. 

CXLI 
If the rose is not our portion do not the thorns remain ? If the 
light does not reach us, does not the fire remain ? If we have not the 
garment, the temple nor the priest, do not the mosque, the dome, the 
minaret, remain? 

CXLII 

Where are the dancers ? Where is the wine ? Hasten that I may 
do honour to the gourd. Happy is the heart which remembers the 
wine in the morning. Oh ! there exist three things in this world 
which are dear to me — a head overtaken with wine, a fair mistress, 
and the sound of singing. 

CXLHI 
O Wheel of Heaven, heedless of bread and salt, you leave me ever 
naked as a fish. The wheel of the weaver weaveth clothes for men, 
therefore it is more charitable than thou, O Wheel of Heaven. 

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McCarthy version 



CXLIV 
O Khayyam, sad is his lot who lets his heart be vexed by earthly 
tribulations. Drink then to the touch of the lute, drink wine in a 
crystal cup, drink before the crystal is dashed against a stone. 

CXLV 

Tell me, friend, what have I acquired of the riches of this world ? — 
Nothing. What has fleeting time left in my hands ? — Nothing. I 
am the torch of joy, but once the torch is extinct I exist no longer. 
I am the cup of Jamshid, but the cup once broken I exist no more. 

CXLVI 
Behold the dawn appears. She has torn aside the veil of night. 
Rise, then, and empty the morning's cup. Why so sad ? Drink, 
heart, drink, for these dawns will follow and follow with their faces 
turned to us, when our faces shall be turned to the earth. 

cxlvh 

If the wheel of heaven denies me bread, am I not prompt for war ? 
If I have not a noble reputation, have I not my shame ? Lo, the 
cup brimmed with a crimson wine. He that will not drink deserves 
to be stoned. 

CXLVm 

Since life flies, what matters it whether it be sweet or bitter? 
Since our soul must escape through our lips, what matters it whether 
it be at Naishapur or Babylon ? Drink, then, for after thou and I 
are dust, the moon will for many days pass from her last to her first 
quarter, and from her first to her last. . 

CXLIX 

Why, when to-day the rose of fortune blossoms, is the wine-cup 
missing from your hands ? Drink, my friend, drink red wine, for 
Time is a merciless fellow, and it is hard to find again a day like this. 

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RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CL 
The month of Ramazan has come, the time of the wine is over. 
Yes, the days of that delicious drink and of our easy life have fallen 
far from us. Woe 's me for the wine that waits undrunken in the 
jar, and the eyes of the fair women that burn for us in vain. 

CLI 

The palace, where Bahram loved to troll the bowl, is now the 
resting-place of stags, the lair of lions. See how this Bahram who 
loved to snare the wild ass with a running noose is snared himself in 
his turn by the tomb. 

CLII 
We have come too late into this whirl and welter of life, and we 
have fallen here, below the level of mankind. Ah ! since life does 
not, alas, move according to our wishes, it were better it should 
cease; for already we have reached satiety. 

CLIII 
Although sin has left me evil of favour, unhappy, I am not without 
hope, in which I am like unto the idolaters who pin their faith to the 
gods of their temples. None the less on the morn when I must die 
of the last night's riot I will clamour for wine and call for my para- 
mour, for what care I for heaven or hell ? 

CLIV 
Oh, my dear companions, pour me wine to make my countenance 
clear with the colour of rubies. When I am dead, wash me in wine, 
and make my litter and my coffin of the wood of the vine. 

CLV 

A draught of wine is better than the empery of Jamshid. The 
perfume of the cup is better than the gifts of Hatim Tai. The sigh 
which slips at dawning from the breast of him who went drunk to 
bed, is better than the lamentations of Majnun. 

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McCarthy version 



CLVI 
The clouds spread over the face of the heavens, and rain patters on 
the sward. How could it be possible to live for a single second with- 
out crimson wine ? This green before me delights my eye, but the 
grass which shall spring from my dust whose eye will delight in ? 

CLVII 
Oh ! thoughtless man, be not deceived by this world, since thou 
knowest its pursuits ! Throw not thy precious life to the wind. 
Hasten to seek thy friend, and delay not to drink wine. 

CLVIII 
For the love of thee which possesses my heart I am ready to accept 
all manner of reproof, and if I break my vow, I will bear the blame 
thereof. Oh, if until the last day I should endure the pain thou 
causest me, the time would seem but too short. 

CLIX 
O heart, my heart, since the very basis of all this world's gear is 
but a fable, why do you adventure in such an infinite abyss of sor- 
rows ? Trust thyself to fate, uphold the evil, for what the pencil has 
traced will not be effaced for you. 

CLX 
■Qf all who have set out upon the long journey, who has come back, 
that I may ask him tidings ? My friends, take heed to let naught go 
by in the hope of hopes for, be sure, you will not come back again. 

CLXI 
Since every waning night, every waning day, cuts off a cantle of 
your life, do not allow these nights and days to heap you thick with 
dust. Daff them gaily by, for, alas, what a world of time you will be 
gone hence while nights and days still wax and wane. 

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RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CLXII 
That heavenly wheel, which tells its tale to no man, has mercilessly 
slain a thousand monarchs and a thousand favourites; drink your 
wine, then, for it gives back life to none. Alas, no one of those that 
quit this world will e'er come back to it. 

CLxni 

O thou, who lordest over the lords of the earth, dost thou know the 
days when wine delighteth the heart ? They are in good sooth the 
Monday, the Tuesday, the Wednesday, the Thursday, the Friday, 
the Saturday, and the Sunday to boot. 

CLXIV 
Heedless man, thy fleshly body is naught, yon vault built up of 
seven shining heavens is naught. Give thyself up to all delight in 
this kingdom of misrule, for our life is only bound to it for a moment 
and that moment itself is nothing. 

CLXV 
This caravan of life passeth in a strange manner — beware, oh, 
friend, for it is the time of thy pleasure which fleeth from thee thus. 
Trouble not thyself, therefore, for the grief which awaiteth our 
friends on the morrow, for behold how the night passeth away ! 

CLXVI 
Once, seeing an old man stagger from the wine-shop, with -his 
prayer mat on his shoulders, and a flagon in his hand, I said to him, 
" What means this, oh, my master ? " and he made answer to me, 
" Drink wine, my brother, for this world is but a breath of wind." 

CLXVII 
A love-lorn nightingale, straying into a garden, and beholding the 
roses smiling, and the cup filled with wine, flew to my ear and sang, 
" Be advised, friend, there is no recalling the vanished life." 

9 8 



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CLXVIII 
He who has laid the foundations of the earth, of the wheel of the 
heavens, what wounds has He not hollowed out in the unhappy- 
heart of man ! What ruby-coloured lips has He not buried in this 
little globe of earth ? What musk-scented tresses has He not hidden 
in the bosom of the dust? 

CLXIX 
Khayyam, your body is like unto a tent, the soul thereof is the 
sultan, and his last home is nothingness. When the sultan quits his 
pavilion, the fatal ferrash strikes it, to set it up at another stage. 

CLXX 

Each drop of wine which the cup-bearer pours into the cup will 
quench the fire of grief in thy burning eyes. Is it not said, O great 
God, that wine is an elixir which drives away all the sorrows that 
weigh down the heart ? 

CLXXI 
When the violet has dyed her veil, when the zephyr has made the 
roses expand their leaves, then he who is wise will drink wine with 
a companion whose body is white as silver, and turn down the cup 
upon the earth. 

CLXXII 
The devout man can never value the divine mercy as we do. A 
stranger can never understand thee like thine own familiar friend. 
Thou sayest, " If thou sinnest, I will send thee to hell." Go, tell that 
to one who knoweth Thee not. 

clxxiii 
O ! my heart, act as if all the wealth of this world were thine — 
think that this house is furnished with all things, that it is adorned 
sumptuously; and pass thy life joyfully in this distracted sphere. 
Say to thyself that thou restest here for but a few days, and wilt then 
arise and depart. 

99 

4. ore. 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CLXXIV 
The days of our abiding on this earth are worthless without wine 
and the cup-bearer, worthless without the soft melodies of Iram's 
lute. I have studied closely the course of earthly things, and I know 
that joy and pleasure alone are dear, all else is worthless. 

CLXXV 
Drawn along by the flying feet of time, which only bestows its 
gifts on the least worthy, my life is overwhelmed with pain and 
travail. In the garden of mankind my heart is closed up like the bud 
of a rose, and like a tulip it is drenched with blood. 

CLXXVI 
Khayyam, who sewed the tents of learning, has fallen suddenly 
into the crater of despair, and here lies calcined. The knife of Fate 
has cut his being's thread, and the impatient world has sold him for 
a song. 1 

CLXXVII 
In spring time I love to sit in the meadow with a paramour perfect 
as a houri and a goodly jar of wine, and though I may be blamed for 
this, yet hold me lower than a dog if ever I dream of paradise. 

CLXXVIII 

Sweet is it to drink red wine in a fair cup. Sweet it is to hear the 
wedded melodies of lutes and harps. The fanatic who recks not of 
the joys of a cup of wine is pleasing only when he is a thousand miles 
away from us. 

CLXXIX 

Get thyself dancing girls, wine, and a mistress as fair as the houris, 
if indeed there be houris, or seek out a limpid stream gushing by a 
meadow, if any meadow be, and ask for no better lot. Vex yourself 
no more with an extinguished hell, for truly there is no other para- 
dise than this, if any paradise there be. 



* See FitzGerald Preface. 

100 



McCarthy version 



CLXXX 
Be on your guard, my friend, for you will be sundered from your 
soul, you will pass behind the curtain of the secrets of heaven. 
Drink wine, for you know not whence you come. Be merry, for you 
know not where you go. 

CLXXXI 

Although the call of duty has led my feet to the mosque, it is not 
truly to lift up my voice in prayer. I stole one day from there a 
carpet, and since this is worn out, I have come here again and 
again. 

CLXXXII 
Let us no longer allow the cares of this world to oppress our souls. 
Let us give ourselves up entirely to drinking wine. Pure limpid and 
rose-coloured. Wine, oh, my friend, is the blood of the world, and 
the world is our murderer ; how can we then refrain from drinking 
the blood of him who has spilt ours ? 

CLXXXIII 
There came a voice at dawning from the wine-shop, crying, 
" Arise, ye haunters of the tavern-divan, arise, and fill the cannikin 
before Fate comes to fill the cup of your being." 

CLXXXIV 

O, my soul ! drink this divine nectar which hath not been stirred : 

drink to the memory of the enchanting idols who enslave the heart 

of man. Wine is the blood of the grape, my beloved, and the vine 

says to thee, " Drink of it, since I have placed it under thy control." 

CLXXXV 
In the season of flowers, drink wine the colour of roses, drink to 
the plaintive notes of the flute, and the melodious sound of the harp. 
I for my part drink thereof and rejoice, and it is congenial to me. If 
thou wilt not drink, what is that to me ? Go, then, and eat stones. 

101 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CLXXXVI 
When the memory of my offences cometh to my mind, the fire, 
which in former days burnt in my heart now covers my face with 
shame. However, it is well known that a generous master will pardon 
the slave who repenteth. 



CLXXXVII 
Oh, my soul, thou and I together are like unto a compass. We 
form but one body, having two points. Truly, we move but from the 
one point, and make the round of the circle ; but the day cometh, and 
is not far off, when the two points must reunite. 1 



CLXxxvni 

At the first, life was given unto me without my consent, therefore 
my own existence filled me with astonishment. Finally, with regret 
we lapse out of this world, understanding neither the purpose of our 
coming, our stay, nor our departure. 



CLXXXIX 
I am a rebellious slave : where is Thy will ? My heart is defiled 
with sins : where is Thy light ? Where is Thy control ? If Thou wilt 
only bestow paradise on those who obey Thy laws it is a debt which 
Thou payest, and where then is Thy mercy ? 



CXC 
Believe not that I fear the world, or that the thought of death and 
the departure of my soul fills me with terror. Since death is a truth, 
what have I to fear from it ? All that I fear is, that my life has not 
been well spent. 






1 See FitzGerald's Notes, lvi. 

102 



McCarthy version 



CXCI 

* I would sell the diadem of the khan, the crown of the king, to pur- 
chase the song of the flute girl. Let us sell the turban, yea, and the 
garment of silk, for a cup of wine ; let us sell the chaplet which alone 
contains a multitude of hypocrisy. 

CXCII 
When the tree of my existence is uprooted, when my members 
are scattered, let them make pitchers of my dust, and let them fill the 
pitchers with wine ; thus shall the dust be quickened again. 

CXCIII 

Oh Thou before whose eyes sin is of no moment, say to him who 
has the wisdom to announce this great truth, that to the mind of the 
philosopher it is the crown of folly to make the divine prescience the 
support of sin. 

CXCIV 
O my friend, come hither, let us forget to-day and to-morrow, and 
steal this one short hour of life. When to-morrow we shall have 
abandoned this old dwelling-place, we shall become the contempo- 
raries of all those who departed hence for the last seven thousand 
years. 

cxcv 
This world has gained nothing by my sojourn here below, and its 
glory and greatness will not be lessened by my departure. I have 
never heard with my ears, and have never been told by anyone the 
reason of my coming or going. 

CXCVI 
All hidden things are known to the Eternal Wisdom, who number- 
eth every hair of our head, and hath fashioned all our members. By 
hypocrisy thou canst deceive mankind, but how wilt thou deceive the 
All-Knowing ? 

103 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CXCVII 

Wine giveth wings to the heavy-hearted. Wine is a mole on the 
cheek of wisdom. We have not drunk of it during the Ramazan 
which has fled, but behold now the night of the month of the drink- 
ing of wine has arrived. 

CXCVIII 
See that thou art never left without wine, for it is wine which fills 
the heart of man with wisdom and with knowledge of religion. If the 
Devil had tasted one drop thereof, he would have adored Adam, and 
would have bowed himself down before him two thousand times. 

CXCIX 

Arise, and strike the earth with thy feet, while we accompany thee 
with our hands. Let us drink in the presence of beautiful women 
with languorous Narcissus eyes. Gladness beginneth not but with 
the twentieth cup, and it is wonderfully rounded when one has come 
to the sixtieth. 

CC 

Never despair, for all thy sins, of the divine mercy of the Merciful 
Master, for if you were to die to-day, dead drunk, to-morrow He 
would pardon your corrupted bones. 

CCI 
Take the cup in your hand, and lift up your voice in the choir of 
the nightingales, for if it were seemly to drink the blood of the vine 
with no sweet concord of harmonious sound, the wine itself would 
make no sound in gurgling from the flagon. 

CCII 
I have closed my heart against covetousness and I am thus 
released from my debt both to those who are men, and those who 
deserve not that name, but since there existeth only one friend who 
will hold me by the hand, I am what I am ; to him alone do I render 
account. 

104 



McCarthy version 



ccm 
O Wheel of Heaven, thy revolving course displeases me. Set me 
free, therefore, for I am unworthy of thy yoke. If thy purpose always 
holds to grant thy favours only to the fools in their folly, I am not 
over-wise nor over-learned. 

ccrv 
God hath promised us wine in Paradise. Therefore how can it be 
denied to us in this world ? An Arab, a prey to drunkenness, one 
day severed with his sword the legs of a certain camel. It is for 
this cause that the prophet has declared wine forbidden. 

ccv 

Since, of all thy past delights, there remaineth to thee only the 
memory, since the only faithful friend remaining to thee is the wine- 
cup, since in truth it is thy only possession, rejoice therefore in it, 
and let not the cup escape from thy hands. 

CCVI 
In this mad world of medley, make haste to pick some flowers. 
Sit in the high places of laughter, and press the cup to your lips. 
Heaven is heedless alike of sin or service, so make merry after your 
heart's desire. 

CCVII 
My love has touched the topmost of its flame. The beauty of her 
who holds my heart in thrall is beyond praise. My heart speaks, but 
my tongue, made mute, refuses utterance to my thoughts. High 
heaven, was aught ever seen so strange ! I am racked with thirst, 
and yet a fresh cool stream flows before me. 

covin 

May the tavern always be thronged with revellers, may fire con- 
sume the skirts of the saintly, may their robes fall in rags, may their 
blue gowns be trampled under the toper's feet. 

*°5 



RUBAlYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCIX 
I am more industrious than thee, thou sage of the town. Though 
I be drunk, I am better than thee, for thou drinkest human bleed 
and I the blood of the vine. Be just and pronounce which of us two 
is the most sanguinary. 

CCX 
Alas ! How long the time will be when we are no longer in this 
world, and the world will still exist. There will remain of us neither 
fame nor trace. The world was not imperfect before we came into 
it — it will be in no wise changed when we are departed hence. 

CCXI 
How long will you remain the dupe of this world's delicate dyes 
and odours ? When will you cease from vexing about the good and 
the bad ? Were you the fountain of youth, were you the very water 
of life itself, that should not save you from sinking into the bosom of 
the earth. 

ccxn 

Our being must be effaced from the book of life, we must expire in 
the arms of death. Oh, enchanting cup-bearer, bring me the liquor 
joyfully, since I must become earth. 

ccxm 

On the day when the juice of the grape does not turn my brain, 
this world has nothing to give but that which is poison to me. Yes, 
the misery of this wretched world is a poison — wine is its only anti- 
dote. To escape then from the terror of the poison, I will take the 
antidote. 

CCXIV 
Behold the little handful of fools, who hold the world in their 
hands, and who in their simple folly think themselves the wisest of 
the wise. Vex not yourself, for in their snug content they call all 
men heretics who are not of a kindred folly. 

106 



McCarthy version 



ccxv 

Abandon thyself to enjoyment, for sorrow is without end. The 
stars will assemble in the heavens in their former courses, and of the 
bricks which they make from thy body will they build palaces for 
others. 

CCXVI 

How long will the unrighteous deeds of others cover our face with 
shame ? How long shall we be consumed in the furnace of this vain 
world? Arise — and like a man cast aside this world's sadness. 
To-day at least is a day of rejoicing — come, let us drink rose- 
coloured wine. 

CCXVII 

I wage a warfare without end against my passions, but what can I 
do ? The remembrance of my iniquities is like a sore burden, but 
what can I do ? I believe truly, that in Thy mercy thou wilt blot out 
my sins. But the knowledge that my dishonour is not hid from 
Thee remaineth — what can I do ? 

CCXVIII 
Those who have trod the world beneath their feet, who have 
wandered over the world in the pursuit of gain, have never learned 
the living truth of life. 

CCXIX 
The day when the celestial steed of golden stars was saddled, 
when the proud planets and the constellations were created — from 
that same day the divan of Fate decreed our lot. How then can we 
be held accountable, since ours is the position that has been made for 
us? 

CCXX 
My soul is often made sorrowful by the movement of the wheel of 
the skies. I struggle against my vile nature. Oh ! that I had wis- 
dom enough to hide myself forever from this world, or understanding 
to live therein, without allowing it to possess my heart ! 

107 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCXXI 
Woe 's me for the best that slips between our fingers ; woe 's me 
for all the hearts that death has drowned in blood ; woe 's me that 
none return from the hither world with tales of those who have 
departed thence. 

CCXXII 

That which renews our youth is wine : it is the living juice of the 
vine, and the company of the fair. And since it was by water that 
this world of nothingness was brought to destruction, all that is left 
for us is to destroy ourselves with wine, and to pass our life in deli- 
cate drunkenness. 

CCXXIII 
Alas, the season of my youth decays, the kindly spring of our 
delights goes by, and that delightful bird, whose name is Youth, has 
flown. It came, I know not whence, and goes, I know not whither. 

CCXXIV 

,• When I am dead, smooth my tomb down to the level of the earth 

without delay, and make me in this wise an example to mankind. 

Then knead the ashes of my body with wine, and make thereof the 

cover of a jar. 

CCXXV 
Bring hither the captain ruby in a cup of crystal, bring hither the 
desired and the beloved of all generous men. Since thou knowest 
that all the dwellers on the earth are but dust, and that when the 
wind passeth over them they are no more, bring hither the wine. 

CCXXVI 
Oh Thou, whom all creation seeketh in madness and despair, the 
dervish and the rich man alike find no way to reach unto Thee. Thy 
name is in the mouth of all men, but all are deaf. Thou art present 
to all eyes, but all are blind. 

1 08 



McCarthy version 



CCXXVII 
How long will you utter these vain complainings against the order 
of the earth? Arise, and make every moment instinct with joy. 
While the world offers so many smiling meadows, drink your crim- 
son wine from a brimming cup. 

CCXXVHI 
When you find yourself in the fellowship of some cypress-slender 
girl, more tender-tinted than the early rose, do not hold aloof from 
the flowers of the meadow, do not let the cup fall from your hand be- 
fore the angel of death, like unto the wild wind that scatters abroad 
the rose-leaves, tears asunder the veil of thy existence. 

CCXXIX 

That high and ominous wheel whose trade it is to play the tyrant 
has never solved for anyone the knot of any perplexity. Where'er it 
sees a bleeding heart it speeds to grind upon the open wound. 

CCXXX 
This vault of heaven under which we move in a vain shadow, may 
be likened unto a lantern; the sun is the focus, and we, like the 
figures, live there in amazement. 

CCXXXI 
This mocking world holds naught but shadows and phantasms. 
He is indeed unlucky who loses his way in the crowd thereof. Rest, 
friend, drink thy wine, open thy heart to mirth, and free yourself thus 
from all these shadows and phantasms. 

CCXXXII 
Do not suffer vain thoughts to enter the gate of your mind. Drink 
while the years drive by, let the cup be always full to the lips. Pay 
your court to the daughter of the vine, and be glad, for it is better 
to enjoy the forbidden daughter than the permitted mother. 

iog 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCXXXIII 
Not once has the wheel of the heavens been favourable to me. 
Never for one moment have I listened to a sweet voice, never for one 
day have I tasted a fleeting happiness, but therefor I have been 
overwhelmed in an abyss of woe. 

ccxxxrv 

Oh ! what a misfortune that it is the ignorant or inexperienced 
who possess the bread well baked — the incomplete, who possess 
complete riches ! The eyes of the beautiful girls are the joy of the 
heart, and it is mere knaves and slaves who are their owners. 

ccxxxv 

O Khayyam, although indeed the Wheel of Heaven, in setting its 
tent, has closed the door to discussions, nevertheless the Eternal 
Cup-Bearer has formed in the cup of creation a thousand other 
Khayyams, like unto thee. 

CCXXXVI 

The day when I shall no longer be known to myself, and when 
they speak of me as a tale that is told : then my heart's desire is that 
from my ashes may be formed a wine jar for the tavern. 

ccxxxvn 

Thou hast fashioned me of water and clay ; how then can I alter 
it? Whether I be made of wool or of silk, it is Thou who hast 
woven ; how then can I alter it ? Thou hast predestined my good 
and evil deeds — how can I alter it ? 



Those mighty and pompous lords, so orgulous in their estates, are 
so devoured by care and sorrow that life is become a bitter burthen. 
Yet, marvellous to note, they will not hail with the name of man 
those who are not, as they are, the slave of their passions. 

1 10 



McCarthy version 



CCXXXIX 
Behold we have fled, and the season sighs for our going; for out 
of a hundred pearls, but one is thridded. Alas, it is owing to the 
ignorance of mankind that a hundred thousand noble thoughts 
remain unuttered. 

CCXL 

With a beloved friend for my companion, that which delights me 

is a cup of wine. When my heart is brimmed with grief, my eyes 

flow a fountain of tears. Alas, since this wretched world is for us of 

short duration, all that is left for us is to pass our, life in drunkenness. 

CCXLI 
An earthly love can seldom inspire perfection. It is like a half 
extinct fire which no longer gives forth heat. He who loveth in 
truth, should not know rest, or food, or sleep, through months, or 
through years, by day, or by night. 

CCXLII 
One cup of wine is worth a hundred hearts, a hundred faiths ; one 
drop of wine is of more value than the empire of kings ! What is 
there in truth to be named before it ? Its bitterness is beyond all the 
sweets of life. 

CCXLIII 
How many men do I behold plunged in the sleep of ignorance 
upon the earth, how many already buried in its bosom ! When I 
cast my eyes over this desert of nothingness, how many souls 
do I see who have not yet arrived — how many who have already 
departed ! 

CCXLIV 
Seeing that Thy mercy is vouchsafed to me, I have no fear for my 
iniquities; since Thou possessest all goodness, I need not be anxious 
to provide myself for the journey. The leaves of the Book have no 
terrors for me, since Thy clemency has cleared my countenance. 

Ill 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCXLV 
Yesterday I beheld at the bazaar a potter smiting with all his 
force the clay he was kneading. The earth seemed to cry out to him, 
" I also was such as thou — treat me therefore less harshly." 

CCXLVI 
Since thou ownest only that which hath been vouchsafed to thee, 
let not thy heart be given over to covetousness. Fix not thy affec- 
tions on the things of this world, for at the end of the play thou wilt 
have to leave all, and convey thyself away. 

CCXLVII 
To-day, the weather is pleasant, it is neither hot nor cold. The 
dew washes the dust from the face of the roses, and the nightingale 
crieth to the yellow flowers, saying, " Ye must drink wine." 

CCXLVin 
May I always hold in my hand a brimming flagon! May my 
love never wane for those fair girls, like unto Houris. Folk say, 
God bids you renounce these joys, but if He gave me such an order, 
I should not obey it. Perish the thought ! 

CCXLIX 
The wheel of the heavens only increaseth our woes beyond meas- 
ure. She giveth nothing to us here that she does not as soon snatch 
away. Oh, if those who have not yet come into the world did but 
know the miseries which await them, truly they would never come. 

CCL 
At the moment when my soul shall be delivered from death, when 
my members shall be scattered from the tree of my life like dry leaves 
before the wind, O, then, with what joy I shall pass out of this world 
through a sieve, before my own dust is passed through it by the 
Builder. 

112 



McCarthy version 



CCLI 
Behold the dawn ; arise, O beardless lad, and fill with ruddy wine 
the clear vessel, for you may seek hereafter, and seek in vain, this 
fair hour which this world of shadows lends you. 

CCLII 
Those who by their learning are the elect of the world, who by 
their intellect climb the heights of heaven, those who scale the firma- 
ment in their search after the things of Divine Wisdom, lose their 
wits, seized with dizziness and all amazement. 

CCLIII 
When you drink, drink with a witty fellowship, drink with fair 
women with smiling lips and tulip-tinted cheeks. Drink not too 
deep, do not babble about it. Do not make it a catch word ; drink, 
but drink discreetly, and in secret. 

CCLIV 
Let not the constant man forswear the juice of the vine, for wine 
contains all the virtue of the very water of life. If anyone will 
renounce his wine during the month of Ramazan, let him at least 
also renounce the recitation of his prayers. 

CCLV 
Do not forswear the juice of the vine if you have any store thereof. 
For many a repenting sign will follow such a sacrifice. The roses 
shed their petals, the nightingales cast their songs abroad upon the 
air ; would it be wise in such an hour to forswear the flagon ? 

CCLVI 
To-morrow I shall have leaped over the mountain which divideth 
us, and shall seize the cup in my hand with surpassing joy. My 
beloved is gracious, the hour is fair and favouring. If I hasten not 
to rejoice in this moment, when shall I know joy and gladness ? 
8 113 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



ccLvn 

They tell us of a paradise, peopled with houris, flowing with wine 
and honey. Then must it be lawful to love wine and women here, 
since such is the goal to which our existence tends. 

CCLVIII 
So long as the friend refuses to pour for me the soul-inspiring 
wine, so long as the skies refuse to shower a thousand kisses on my 
face and feet, so long will it be idle, when the holy month is at hand, 
to bid me give my flagon the go-by. How can I renounce it when 
God has not so ordered me? 

CCLIX 
The very hills would leap for joy did you but wash their steeps 
with wine. Only a fool is scornful of the flagon. You who bid me 
renounce the juice of the vine, learn that wine is the soul, the 
complement of man. 

CCLX 
In the ways of the soul thou must walk with understanding. About 
the things of this world thou must keep silence. Though thou hast 
ears, eyes, and tongue, thou must be as if thou hadst them not. 

CCLXI 
Drink your wine in the fellowship of those slender beings, the 
crimson of whose cheeks disturbs the heart. Friend, when you are 
bitten by the serpent of sorrow, drink the antidote. For my part I 
drink and I boast thereof, may it prove good to me. If you will not 
drink, what would you that I should do ? Go, fool, and eat the earth. 

CCLXH 
He who, in this world, possesses half a loaf and can shelter himself 
in any nest, he who is neither the master, nor slave of any man, tell 
him his lot is sweet and tranquil, and he should live content therein. 

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McCarthy version 



CCLXIII 
Sometimes the draught of our life is clear, sometimes turbid. 
Sometimes our robes are wool, sometimes of silk. All that is of no 
moment to the enlightened soul ; but is it of no moment to die ? 

CCLXTV 
The greatest wisdom consists in drawing the delight of our hearts 
from the wine flagon ; letting not our thoughts dwell on the present or 
the past ; and finally in releasing, if but for a moment, from the bonds 
of reason, this soul which groans in this prison-house wherein it is 
for a time enclosed. 

CCLXV 
If you are indeed my friends, silence your vain discourse, and 
soften my sorrows by filling my cup with wine. When I am turned 
to dust, mould of my dust a brick, and place that brick in some gap 
in the walls of a tavern. 

CCLXVI 

No man has pierced the secrets of the cause. No man has ever 
passed a step outside himself. I watch, and I observe only imperfec- 
tion from the pupil to the Master, imperfection in all that is born of 
woman. 

CCLXVII 
Folk talk of Paradise where houris dwell, where the Heavenly 
river flows, where wine and honey and sugar abound! Bah! Fill 
me quick a cup of wine and put it in my hand, for a present pleasure 
is worth a thousand future joys. 

ccLxvni 
From time to time my heart seems cabined in its cage. It is a 
disgrace to be thus blended of water and of earth. I dreamed of 
breaking down this prison-house, but then my foot would slip on the 
stone of the law of the Koran. 

"5 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCLXIX 
They tell us that the moon of Ramazan is close at hand, that we 
must forswear wine. Well and good, then I propose at the end of 
the feast to drink so deep that I shall be drunken to the very end of 
the sacred month. 

CCLXX 

The potters who without cease plunge their hands in the clay, 
who give all their mind, all their skill, to form it, how long will they 
continue to trample it under foot, to smite it with their hands ? 
"What then are their thoughts ? Do they not consider that it is the 
mould of mankind they treat thus ? 

CCLXXI 
Drink, then, drink of the wine which giveth eternal life. Drink, 
for it is the fountain of life and of youth. It burneth as a flame, but 
like unto the water of life it dispelleth sorrow — drink therefore. 

cclxxh 

Has Thy empire gained in glory by my service, O Lord my God ; 
has Thy grandeur suffered aught by my sins ? Forgiveness, God, 
and punish not, for I know that You punish late and pardon early. 

CCLXXIII 
There are those who in the madness of their arrogance are fallen 
into the depths of pride, others again who abandon themselves to the 
quest of houris and celestial palaces. When at last the veil is drawn 
it will be revealed that they all have fallen far, far, far, from Thee. 

cclxxiv 
Alas, my heart can find no comfort, my soul is on the point of 
escaping from my lips, without having attained its desire. Alas ! my 
life has passed without knowledge, and the essence of this love 
remaineth unknown. 

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McCarthy version 



CCLXXV 

Seize the sparkling cup in thy hand, as soon as the yellow day- 
break appeareth. Truth is sharp, it has been said, in the mouth of 
mankind, for this cause, it may be, that wine is very truth. 

CCLXXVI 
How long wilt thou expend thy existence on vain self-love, or in 
searching for the source of being and of not being? Drink wine, 
then, for since thy life must be followed by death, thou hadst best 
pass it in sleep or in drunkenness. 

CCLXXVH 
O, beloved, before care seizeth thee, bid them serve us with wine 
the colour of roses. Thou art not made of gold, O thoughtless fool, 
that thou shouldst hope to be dug up after thou art laid in the earth. 

ccLxxvin 
It would be hard for my hand, familiar with the flagon, to handle 
the Koran, and rest upon the pulpit. It is different with you, you 
dusty devotee ; as for me, I am a sodden swiller, and I do not know 
that flame can fire fluid. 

CCLXXIX 
Be not desirous of the things of this world. If you would live in 
happiness, break in sunder the bonds which hold you captive to 
earthly joys and sorrows. Be content, for the heavens move in their 
accustomed course, and your life is of short duration. 

CCLXXX 
Oh, my friend, wherefore vex thyself with the problem of existence. 
Wherefore trouble thy heart and thy soul thus with idle questioning ? 
Live thy life in joy and gladness, for after all, thy counsel was not 
asked in the ordering of human affairs. 

117 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCLXXXI 
It is said that there will be judgment at the last day, and that the 
Beloved Friend will be enraged. But from the Eternal Goodness, 
good alone can proceed. Fear not, therefore, for thou shalt find 
mercy at the last. 

CCLXXXII 
Drink wine, before thy name has vanished from the world, for 
when that nectar floweth into thy heart, care will depart therefrom. 
Unbind the tresses of the loved one's hair before the sinews of thy 
own bones are themselves unbound. 

CCLXXXIII 
Behold the dawn arises. Let us rejoice in the present moment 
with a cup of crimson wine in our hand. As for honour and fame, let 
that fragile crystal be dashed to pieces against the earth. 

CCLXXXIV 
No one has ever drawn aside the veil of Fate. To no one are the 
hidden things of the Divine Wisdom made known. For seventy-two 
years I have thought thereon, by day and night, but I have learned 
nothing, and the enigma remaineth unsolved. 

CCLXXXV 
See that thou drinkest not thy wine in the company of some clown, 
riotous, having neither wit nor manners. Nought but dissensions 
can come of it. In the night-time thou wilt suffer from his drunken- 
ness, his clamour and his folly. On the morrow his prayers and his 
penitence will cause thy head to ache. 

CCLXXXVI 
Oh, Wheel of Heaven, you fill my soul with sadness, you rend my 
garb of joy, you change the air I breathe into water, the water I drink 
into earth. 

118 



McCarthy version 



CCLXXXVII 
Once thou art in the tavern, thou canst only make thy ablutions 
with wine. When thy name hath once been befouled there, thou 
canst not again cleanse it. Bring hither the wine therefore, since the 
covering of our shame hath been torn beyond repair. 

CCLXXXVIII 
What dweller on this earth has ever folded in his embrace a fair 
one with rose-tinted cheeks, who has not first received some thorn in 
the heart from time ? Behold this comb, before it can be suffered to 
touch the scented hair of beauty, it has to be hacked into a ridge of 
teeth. 

CCLXXXIX 
Drink wine, for therein thou shalt find forgetfulness for all thy 
anxieties, and it will deliver thee from thy meditations on the prob- 
lems of the earth. Renounce not this alchemy, for if thou drinkest 
but one measure thereof, it will scatter to the winds thy endless 
cares. 

CCXC 
Open to me, O God, the gate of Thy gifts. Give me to eat, that I 
may owe nothing to Thy creatures, give me to drink till drunkenness 
drowns sorrow. 

CCXCI 
Wine is forbidden, it is said, but it is only forbidden in regard to 
him who makes no measure of what he drinks, and the one with 
whom he drinks. All the conditions once held in observance, will not 
the wise man drink ? 

CCXCII 

They who dwell within the tombs have become dust and ashes, 
are scattered to the four winds, and divided from each other. Alas ! 
what drink is this with which mankind is filled, and which holds him 
thus infatuated until the day of the last judgment ? 

119 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCXCIII 
Be welcome, solace of my soul, scarcely can I believe that thou 
art here. Drink, for God's love, if not for mine, drink wine till I can 
doubt thy being. 

CCXCIV 
There are those who have never passed the night in the search 
after truth, who have no thoughts beyond their narrow lives. These 
thou mayest behold clothed in the garments of the great, and dispar- 
aging the walker in the perfect way. 

CCXCV 
Thou shouldst not plant the tree of bitterness in thy heart, but 
rather flutter at all times the leaves of the book of joy. Thou shouldst 
drink thy wine, and pursue the desire of thy heart, for behold the 
length of thy stay on this earth is quickly measured. 

CCXCVI 
Thou settest snares around us manifold, and sayest, " Death to ye, 
if ye enter therein." Thou layest the lures Thyself, and then givest 
over Thy victim to doom. 

ccxvn 

Enjoy thy life while it remaineth to thee, for many other wayfarers 
will journey through the world. The soul crieth out after the body 
has been torn away from it, and the crown of thy head will be 
trampled under the feet of potters. 

ccxcvni 

Happy is the heart of him who hath gone through life unknown. 
Whom the vestment of hypocrisy hath never clothed, who like unto 
the sage is translated into the skies, instead of rejoicing like an owl 
among the ruins of this world. 

120 



McCarthy version 



CCXCEX 
Rose, thou art like unto a lovely face ; Rose, thou art like unto a 
precious ruby. O, shifting Fortune, every second you seem strange 
to me, yet you are like unto a familiar friend. 

CCC 

The drunkard who is rich bringeth himself to destruction, his 
riotous drunkenness is a scandal to mankind. I will therefore place 
this hashish in my cup of wine and thus I will strangle the serpent of 
my grief. 

CCCI 
The drinker alone can understand the language of the rose and of 
the vine, and not the faint-hearted, and the cheap of wit. To those 
who have no knowledge of hidden things, ignorance is to be pardoned, 
for the drunkard only is capable of tasting the delights which are an 
accompaniment thereof. 

cccn 
Open the gate, for only Thou canst open it ; show me the road, for 
only Thou canst show it. I will reach no hand to those who would 
fain uplift me, for Thou alone art eternal. 

cccni 

Lulled by a vain hope, I scattered to the winds a portion of my life, 
and that before I had known in this world a day of enjoyment. Alas ! 
I fear now that fleeting time will not allow me to repay myself for the 
days that are past. 

CCCIV 
It is I who am the chief frequenter of the tavern, it is I who wade 
knee deep in rebellion against Thy commandment. It is I who the 
whole night through, soaked in wine, hurl the complaint of my 
wounded heart against the ears of God. 

121 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



cccv 

When I am drunk, the whole world might roll like a ball into a hole, 
and I should not care more than for a barley-corn. Yestere'en I 
pawned myself at the tavern for a stoup of wine, " Lo, what an excel- 
lent gage ! " says the tapster. 

CCCVI 
For how many nights has sleep fled from our eyelids, before the 
cruel parting has torn our hearts asunder ! Arise, my beloved, and 
let us live for an instant before the breath of dawn blows upon us. 
Alas, for how long a time it will still breathe when our breath is 
extinct ! 

cccvn 

Two things are the base of wisdom, the pearls of tradition : eat 
not of all that is eaten, hold aloof from all that is evil. 

CCCVIII 
How long wilt thou condemn us, O foolish devotee ? We are the 
frequenters of the tavern, we are given over to drunkenness without 
cease. Thou art entirely absorbed in thy chaplet, in thy hypocrisy, 
in thy vile devices. We follow the desires of our hearts with the 
wine-cup forever in our hand, and our loved one beside us. 

CCCIX 
The steady march of springs and autumns sweeps the leaves from 
our life's trees. Drink wine, friend, for the wise have wisely said, 
" Life's cares are a poison, and wine its best antidote." 

cccx 
Thou who hast burned, who burnest, who deservest still to burn, 
feeding the fire of hell, why dost thou call on God to pardon Omar ? 
What has God to do with thee ? How darest thou appeal to His pity ? 1 



1 See Fitzgerald Preface. 

122 



McCarthy version 



CCCXI 

Art thou full of heaviness ? Take thou a morsel of hashish, as 
large as a grain of barley, or drink but a small measure of rose-coloured 
wine. Thou art become a sage, truly ! Thou mayst not drink this, 
thou takest not that! Nothing is left to thee but to eat pebbles — go, 
and eat them then. 

CCCXII 
No longer, O Reason, will I continue to be thy slave ; wherefore 
should I care if in this world I remain for fifty years, or but one day 
is left to me ? Come, let us drink wine from the flagon before we our- 
selves become pots in the shop of the potter. 

CCCXIII 
I met a wise man in a drunkard's house, and asked him tidings of 
the absent ones. He answered, " Drink your wine, for many like unto 
us have gone hence, and not returned again." 

CCCXIV 
I know not & He who created me belongs to happy paradise or 
terrible hell, but I know that a cup of wine, a fair paramour, and a 
lute on the borders of a pleasant land, rejoice my heart in this present 
hour, and that thou livest on the promise of a future paradise. 

CCCXV 
It is dawn, ever welcome, beloved, sing your song, and drink your 
wine, for the long array of months has overthrown a thousand kings 
like Djemshid and Kai-Khosrou. 

CCCXVI 
I drink of the wine, and they who oppose it come about me on the 
right hand and on the left, to persuade me to renounce it, saying that 
wine is the enemy of religion. But, therefore, because I hold myself 
an adversary of the faith, I wish by Allah to drink thereof, for it is 
permitted to drink the blood of one's enemy. 

123 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCCXVII 
If I were free to use my will, if I were free from cares of good and 
evil in this worthless world, how willingly would I choose never to 
have come here, never to have lived here, never to depart hence. 

cccxvm 
How is it that grapes are sour at first, and after, sweet ? How is it 
that wine is bitter ? If a bit of wood is fashioned with a knife into a 
viol, how is it that the same knife can fashion a lute ? 



CCCXIX 
From afar came one foul-favoured, clad about as in smoke of hell, 
sex-less, horrible. He broke our flagon, spilling the red wine, and 
boasted that the deed was glorious. 



CCCXX 
Since we abide in this world in no fixed habitation, it truly would be 
a fatal error to abstain from the wine-cup and the caresses of our be- 
loved ones. Oh, man of peace, how long wilt thou continue thy vain 
reasoning on the creation and eternity of this world? — What to me 
will be its antiquity or newness when I no longer abide herein ? 

CCCXXI 
Plague upon heart-breaking hypocrisy, O cup-bearer: up, and 
hither with the wine, O cup-bearer; to buy it, sell the prayer-cloth 
and the sacred turban, for wine is the end of all my argument. 



CCCXXII 
O heart, when thou sittest at the feet of thy beloved, thou hast lost 
thyself to find thyself. When thou hast quaffed the wine of nothing- 
ness, thou art set apart from those that are, and those that are no 
more. 

124 



McCarthy version 



CCCXXIII 

The commandments of religion only insist on the fulfilling of thy 
obligation to the Deity. Refuse not thy morsel of bread to another, 
refrain thy tongue from slander, and seek not to render evil to thy 
neighbour. If thou doest this, I myself promise thee the future life. 
— Bring hither the wine ! 

CCCXXIV 
Bestir thyself, since thou art cooped beneath this inexorable vault, 
drink wine, since thou art perforce in this luckless world. If anything 
from first to last be but earth, at least bear thyself as if thou still didst 
walk the earth, not as if thou wert already laid beneath it. 

cccxxv 

heart, my heart you will never know the secret, you will never 
top the wisdom of the wise. Make for yourself a heaven here with 
wine, for who knows if you will or will not relish the higher heaven ? 

CCCXXVI 
Choose ignorance, if you have wit, that you may take the bowl of 
wine from the hands of the drinkers of eternity. But if you are igno- 
rant, ignorance is not for thee. It is not given to all the ignorant to 
taste the sweets of ignorance. 

cccxxvn 

1 cannot live without wine, I could not bear the body's burden but 
for the juice of the vine. I am the slave of that sweet moment when 
the cup-bearer offers me yet another draught, and I am too drunk to 
take it. 

CCCXXVIII 
How long will these wrangle on the five and four, O cup-bearer ! 
It is as hard to understand one as one hundred thousand, O cup- 
bearer ; we are but earth, so tune the lute, O cup-bearer ; we are but 
as soft air, bring wine, O cup-bearer ! 

J 25 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



cccxxrx 
Wert thou as wise as Aristotle, wert thou as potent as Roman 
Caesar, or Monarch of Cathay, drink, drink, I say, in the cup of Djem- 
shid, for the grave is the end of all, yea, wert thou Bahram himself, 
the tomb is thy final abode. 

CCCXXX 
A sheikh said to a harlot, "Thou art drunk; each moment thou 
art caught in some one's nets." She answered unto him, " O sheikh, 
I am all that thou callest thy servant, but thou, art thou all thou ap- 
pearest to be ?" 



CCC3 

We have wine, and the well-beloved, and the morning, O cup- 
bearer. Not from us cometh renunciation, O cup-bearer. How long 
wilt thou tell the tales of old, O cup-bearer ? Bring me sweetly the 
peace of the soul, O cup-bearer. 



ccc: 

It is my pleasure to drown my reason in wine : our secret sessions 
are called for the service of the wine-cup : O hermit of the heart, do 
not, in your pilgrimage, deny yourself the cup : be like us, who are 
fire-worshippers, and delight in the lip of the lover. 

cccxxxin 
We take the Koran in one hand, and the wine-cup in the other, and 
behold we are lured now to the lawful, now to the unlawful delight. 
Thus it comes to pass that underneath yon spangled bowl we are 
neither all faithful, nor all faithless. 

CCCXXXIV 
Drink wine, for behold how the juice moisteneth the sides of the 
jar. How often need I say that I have broken the seals of all my 
vows ? Yet, is it not better to break the seals of a hundred oaths, 
than to break the sides of a jar of wine ? 

126 



McCarthy version 



cccxxxv 
Do not set the estimate of your life above sixty years ; do not set 
your foot anywhere without being intoxicated. So long as your skull 
is not made into a jar, do not set the gourd from your shoulders, nor 
the cup from your hand. 

CCCXXXVI 

Arise, dash down the cares of fleeting life, be merry in this mo- 
mentary being. If heaven had been constant in its gifts to others, 
remember that you could never have taken their turn of enjoyment. 

CCCXXXVII 
When I gaze, I seem to see the grass, the streams of paradise. 
Earth, freed from winter's hell, seems turned to heaven. Rest 
with some fair face in this fair place. 



Follow the footsteps of the kalendars, abide in the tavern, think 
only of wine, women, and song. With cup and can, O well-beloved, 
drink and cease to battle of vain things. 



We have broken all our vows, we have closed the gates of good and 
evil fame ; do not blame us for being foolish in our folly, for we are 
drunk with the wine of love. 

CCCXL 
Reach me tulip-tinted wine, pour the pure blood of the vine from 
the throat of the flagon, for where in these days shall I find so true a 
friend save in the wine-cup ? 

CCCXLI 
Those that have gone hence before us, O cup-bearer, are lapped in 
the dust of pride, O cup-bearer ; drink then thy wine, and hear the 
truth I tell ; the words they whispered were but wind, O cup-bearer. 

127 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCCXLII 
Thou hast stamped us with a strange seal, Thou hast made us do 
strange deeds. How can I be better than I am, for such as I am, You 
drew me from the void ? 

cccxLin 
Be wise, O my fair, and lighten the load of thy lover, for all thy 
goodly show will not endure, like all the world thy feet will go down 
to the dust. 

CCCXLIV 
Thou who commandest the quick and the dead, the wheel of heaven 
obeys Thy hand. What if I am evil, am I not Thy slave ? Which 
then is the guilty one ? Art Thou not Lord of all ? 

CCCXLV 
O offspring of the four and five, art puzzled by the four and five ? 
Drink deep, for I have told thee time on time, that once departed, 
thou returnest no more. 

CCCXLVI 
Now Thou art hidden, known of none, now Thou art displayed in 
all created things. It is for Thy own delight that Thou performest 
these wonders, being at once the sport and the spectator. 

CCCXLVII 
If you find fame in a town you are considered evil. If you live in a 
nook, you are looked upon as a schemer. The best thing for any 
man, were he a saint or a prophet, would be to live, knowing no one, 
known of no one. 

cccxLvni 

It is better to lighten one sad soul, than to people a world. It is 
nobler to enslave one free man with charity, than to set free a thou- 
sand slaves. 

128 



McCarthy version 



CCCXLIX 

Lo, the moment for the morning wine, hear the muezzin, O cup- 
bearer. Here is a wine-house, here is wine, we are ready, O cup- 
bearer. This is no time for prayers, cease babbling of devotion, 
drink and be still, O cup-bearer. 



CCCL 
If I am the friend of wine and drunkenness, why should I be 
blamed ? If all unlawful deeds produced intoxication, there would be 
little sober reason left on earth. 



CCCLI 
In this juggling house of life, friendship is a vain thing ; be wise 
and trust none. Bear thy pains, seek no remedy, be cheerful in thy 
sorrows, and seek not to share them with others. 



CCCLH 

O my King, how many a man like me in the rose-bower, in the 
fair fellowship of dancers and drinkers, remains aloof, an onlooker ? 
A garden, a wine-jar, and a lute are better than Paradise with its 
streams and houris. 



CCCLIII 
I saw a hermit in a desert place. He was neither heretic nor true 
>eliever, he had neither riches, nor creed, nor God, nor truth, nor 
[aw, nor knowledge. Where is the man of like courage in this 
rorld or the other world ? 



CCCLIV 

Wouldst thou have the world at thy feet, then strengthen- thy 
soul, and believe with me that wisdom lies in drinking wine and 
daffing the world aside. 

9 129 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCCLV 
It is well to be of good reputation : it is ill to complain of Heaven's 
injustice. It is better to be drunk with the blood of the vine than 
swollen with sham piety. 

CCCLVI 
Give me to drink of that flower-coloured wine, O cupbearer ; pour, 
for my soul is laden with sorrow, O cup-bearer ; pour, I say, for in 
setting me free from myself, it sets me free also from the cares of 
this world, O cup-bearer. 

ccclvh 

Give me delightful wine, O cup-bearer, that divine juice which, 
like a chain of linked rings, holds fools and sages in sweet servitude. 

CCCLVIII 
This wheel of heaven seeks my destruction and thine, it plots 
against my soul and thine. Come, seat thyself upon the grass, for 
in a little while fresh grass will spring from this dust of mine and 
thine. 

CCCLIX 
We are all lovers, all bibbers, all worshippers of the vine, we are 
all in the tavern free from thoughts of good and evil. Trouble not 
our intelligence, for we are all drunk. 

CCCLX 
Last night in the tavern my familiar friend held out the cup and 
bade me drink of it. "I will not drink," I said, and he replied, 
" Drink for my love's sake." 

CCCLXI 
Yesterday I sat by a stream with a beautiful girl and a vessel of 
wine. Before me stood the shell whose pearl gave forth such light 
that the cock crew, believing it was dawn. 

130 



McCarthy version 



CCCLXII 
Do not heed the speech of frivolous women, but seize the cup of 
clear wine from the hands of the comely. All who ever trod this 
earth have vanished one by one, and who can say that one has e'er 
returned ? 

CCCLXIII 
When my soul and thine have flitted, they will place a couple of 
bricks upon my grave and thine. Then to make bricks for other 
tombs they will send to the kiln my dust and thine. 

CCCLXIV 
That palace which touched the heavens, before whose door kings 
bowed the head, we saw the ringdove on its battlements, resting and 
crying, " Coo, coo, coo, coo ! " * 

CCCLXV 
To drink and delight in fair faces is wiser than to affect a hypo- 
critical faith. If all the lovers, and all the joyous topers, go to hell, 
nobody will want to go to Paradise. 2 

ICCCLXVI 
What is the good of our entrance to, our exit from, this world ? 
hat has become of all our hopes ? Where is the breath of all the 
se and good who have been turned to dust ? 
i 



cccLXvn 
We drink wine old and new, we would sell the world for a brace of 
arley-corns. Do you know where you go after death ? Give me 
some wine and go where you please. 



CCCLXVni 
Flee from the lessons of learning and piety, turn to the tresses 
round the lovely face, spill the blood of the vine in your cup before 
time spills thy blood on the earth. 



1 See Quatrains Printed in Second Edition Only, xx. 

2 See Quatrains Printed in Second Edition Only, lxv, 

131 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYyAm 



ccclxix 
The strong wine of ourselves has exalted us with joy; we that 
were lowly, hold our heads high ; now we are free from the body's 
dominion, we have returned to earth from whence we rose. 

CCCLXX 
A fig for mosques, prayers, fastings; hie thee to the tavern and 
get drunk, even if thou hast to beg for it. Drink, my Khayyam, 
for soon that earth of thine will be fashioned into cups and bowls 
and jars. 

CCCLXXI 
Not for one hour can I shake off the world, not for one moment 
can I buy content. Long, long have I served in the school of sorrow, 
and still am master neither of this world nor the next. 

cccLxxn 
To you this earthly cup is big with a soul, like to a jasmin bearing 
blossoms of the Judas tree. Nay, the fair clearness of the wine 
deceives me, it is clear water big with liquid fire. 

CCCLXXIII 
This world of dust from corner to corner, notwithstanding the 
study of the Wise-Eyed, will see no better production of the faithless 
earth than clear wine and lovely beings. 

CCCLXXIV 
Hearken unto me, thou that hast not yet seen thy friends grow 
old. Vex not thyself about the wheel of heaven, content thee with 
what thou hast, and placidly behold life's juggles with the destinies 
of men. 

CCCLXXV 
Be genial to the genial revellers, follow, my friend, the wisdom of 
Khayyam. Away with prayers, away with fasts ; drink deep and be 
kindly. 

132 



McCarthy version 



CCCLXXVI 
Are you not ashamed, O Mullah, thus to ignore all the ordinances 
and all the prohibitions ? Even if you heaped up all the treasures of 
the earth, what can you do with them at last, save leave them to 
some one else? 

CCCLXXVH 
Do not call to mind the day which has passed from you ; do not 
lament for unborn to-morrow, do not build on the coming and the 
past away, take the fair hour, and do not cast your life to the wind. 

CCCLXXVIII 
If I, like God, were master of the heavens, I would blot them from 
the world, and fashion new skies beneath which free man might gain 
his heart's desire. 

CCCLXXIX 
Every day at dawn, I will haste to the wine-house with the subtle 
kalendars. O, Thou that hast the key to hidden secrets, give mc 
faith if Thou wouldst have me prayerful. 

CCCLXXX 

Thanks to you, mirror-like disc of heaven, thanks to the favours of 
this fleeting time which fall but to the basest, my cheeks, hollow as 
cups, are brimmed with tears, and my heart, like a jar, is full of 
blood. 

CCCLXXXI 
There is a bull in heaven named Parwin, there is another bull that 
bears the earth ; open the eyes of knowledge and behold this drove 
of asses placed between two bulls. 

CCCLXXXII 
Lo, light, and wine, and plenilune, O cup-bearer; lo, the beauty 
lovelier than the captain-jewel, O cup-bearer; talk not of earth unto 
this burning heart, cast it not to the wind ; bring drink, O cup-bearer. 

133 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



cccLxxxin 
Vainly you rave of ruby-tinted lips, vainly you whisper of the 
sweetness of wine, and the melodies of lute and dulcimer. Be God 
my witness, that till you sever the ties of earth, your existence 
is vain. 

CCCLXXXIV 
All that thou sayest of me is steeped in hate, thou callest me un- 
believer, atheist ; I am what I am, and make a vouch of it, but is it 
just for thee to rail at me ? 

CCCLXXXV 
I can renounce all, but wine — never. I can console myself for all 
else, but for wine — never. Is it possible for me to become a good 
mussulman, and to give up old wine? — Never. 

CCCLXXXVI 
Clear comely wine, I fain would drink so deep of thy divinity that 
those beholding me from afar should blend my being with thine and 
say, "O Lord Wine, whence comest thou?" 

CCCLXXXVII 
Before you drain the cup of death, before the wheel of time has 
hurled you back, get goods and gear while you are here, for in the 
lower land, no welcome has the empty hand. 

CCCLXXXVIII 
Dearest, while we tread this earth, lift the jar and drink its wine. 
Ere the potter turns to shape from thy dust and mine, other jars for 
other lips, fill my cup and empty thine. 

CCCLXXXIX 
Thy cup is brimmed with molten rubies, O cup-bearer; feed my 
soul with the flashes of that flaming stone, O cup-bearer, give to my 
hands that holy bowl, O cup-bearer, that I might lend new being to 
my soul, O cup-bearer. 

134 






McCarthy version 



cccxc 
While still you boast of bones, and veins, and sinews, abide in the 
circle of your destiny. Yield nothing to your enemy, were he 
Rustem, son of Zal ; be under no bond of obligation to your friend, 
were he Hatim Tai. 

CCCXCI 
Do you desire a happy life, do you desire a heart devoid of care, 
then drink, drink, drink with every passing minute, and from each 
draught find new delight in life. 

cccxcn 
I have swept the threshold of the tavern with my hair, I have given 
the good-bye to thoughts of good and ill, of this world and the other. 
When I am drunk, they might both roll into a ditch, without my 
heeding them more than two barley-corns. 

CCCXCIII 
I passed into the potter's house of clay, and saw the craftsman 
busy at his wheel, turning out pots and jars fashioned from the heads 
of kings, and the feet of beggars. 

CCCXCIV 
Since thou knowest the secrets, O youth, why so racked with des- 
pairing doubts ? Though the wheel of life does not turn to thy 
pleasure, still be merry in this hour, while still thou drawest breath. 

CCCXCV 
Last eve I broke against a stone an earthen cup, drunk in the 
doing of this foolish deed. Methought the cup protested unto me 
"I was like thee, thou wilt be like to me." 

CCCXCVI 
Bear greeting from me to Khayyam and then say, " Oh, inexperi- 
enced Khayyam, when then have I said that wine is unlawful ? To 
the foolish it is unlawful, but to the wise it is lawful." 

135 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCCXCVH 
Still to me my breath, thanks to the cup-bearer, remains, but in 
the fellowship of created things, discontent remains. Of yestere'en's 
wine, only a flagon remains, but I know not how much of life yet 
remains. 

cccxcvni 
When the hand possesses a loaf of wheaten bread, two measures 
of wine, and a piece of flesh, when seated with tulip-cheeks in some 
lonely spot, behold such joy as is not given to all sultans. 



CCCXCIX 
Be not rough with the pot-companions, be not gruff with the wise- 
acres, but drink your wine, for whether you drink wine or no, if you 
are seared with hell-fire, you shall not hope to pass into paradise. 



CCCC 
In the assemblage of lovers we all are seated, from the labour of 
days we have all escaped, we have emptied the cup of the wine of 
our desire, we are all free and tranquil and intoxicated. 



CCCCI 
Thou hast broken my wine-jug, O Lord, Thou hast closed against 
me the door of delight, O Lord, Thou hast spilt upon the earth my 
clear wine ; earth be in my mouth unless Thou art drunk, O Lord. 



ccccn 
A mouthful of wine is better than empire. Abjure all save wine. 
One cup of wine is better than the kingdom of Feridoun. The tile 
which covers the mouth of the wine-jar is more precious than the 
crown of Kai-Khosrou. 

136 



McCarthy version 



ccccin 

Lo, the season of roses is at hand, and then it delights me to defy 
the law of Alkoran with budding girls of tulip-cheeks ; for a measure 
of five days my cups shall convert the green grass into beds of tulips. 

ccccrv 

Bear greeting from me to Mustapha, and then with all respect 
enquire thus, " Why, O Lord All-Wise, does Alkoran make the sour 
salted curds and water lawful, and pure wine unlawful ? " 

CCCCV 
O thou that turnest day and night to lust after the world, dost thou 
not think upon the heavy day ? Look to thyself and to thy latest 
breath, and to the end that thou must share with others. 

CCCCVI 
We made the mouth of a jar our place of prayer, the ruby wine 
made us seem truly men ; it is better to be in the street of the tavern, 
than to leave life to wither in the mosque. 

CCCCVII 
Make the conditions of this world easy unto my heart, and make 
my evil actions secret from creation. Give me to-day my pleasure, 
and to-morrow inflict on me whatever Thy liberality deems meet. 

CCCCVIII 
Now that the brown bird tells his tale, his tale, think of red wine 
in the hands of topers, topers. Arise, approach, for the rose ex- 
pands in gladness, for two or three days thy pains avenge, avenge. 

CCCCIX 
We are the keys of the scheme of existence, we to wise eyes are 
the very essence of divinity. Is not the hoop of the world like unto a 
ring, and are not we the wrought gems thereof ? 

137 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



ccccx 

If I feed in famine-hunted Ramazan, it is not through forgetful- 
ness, but because the clinging fasts have changed my days to nights* 
and deluded me into believing that I ate the morning meal. 

CCCCXI 
While I searched the pages of the Book of Love, a wise man 
lifted up his voice and said, " Happy is he who holds in his house a 
girl more lovely than the moon, and dreams of a night-time longer 
than a year." 

CCCCXII 
If thou canst understand the circuit of this wheel, thou must per- 
ceive two kinds of men, those knowing good and evil, and those that 
know neither themselves nor aught else. 

ccccxni 
O friend, abide tranquil in thy day, nor grieve for fleeting time in 
vain, when the garb of life is rent, it matters little what thou hast 
done, what thou hast said, and in what way thou hast been stained. 

CCCCXIV 
Whenever on this green earth we are affected by joy, like unto 
the green steed of the sky, then with green youth I eat green hashish 
on the green sward until I lie below the green of the earth. 

CCCCXV 
O thou, the quintessence of the sum of existence, cease a moment 
to think upon evil gain, take one cup of wine from the eternal Saki, 
and set thyself free from the cares of both worlds. 

CCCCXVI 
Arise, arise from thy place of sleep, O cup-bearer, give us, O give 
us clear wine, O cup-bearer, ere yet the cups of our heads are made 
into flagons, pour from thy flagon into our cup, O cup-bearer. 

138 



McCarthy version 



ccccxvn 
To the wise reader in the Book of Life, joy, sorrow, weal, and woe 
are all alike. Since good and ill alike must have their end, it matters 
little whether our portion be good or evil. 



ccccxvni 
Cease babbling of the Koran, cup-bearer, give me free quarters at 
the wine-house, O cup-bearer ; the night of those free quarters in the 
inn shall be my night of nights, O cup-bearer. 



CCCCXTX 
Know you why at the hour of the dawning the cock shrills his fre- 
quent clarion ? It is but to remind you by the mirror of morning, 
that from your existence a night has slipped, and you are still 
ignorant. 

ccccxx 
Art wise enough to learn in little the truth of man ? A miserable 
being moulded from the mud of sorrow. A little while he eats upon 
this earth, then lifts his foot to wander hence. 



CCCCXXI 
Never with cheer a drop of water do we consume, but from the 
hand of sorrow we consume wine. We never dip a bit of bread in 
salt, but we consume our own vitals. 



ccccxxn 

Lord, free me from this puzzle of the more and less. Absorb me 
in Thee and free me from myself. "While I can reason I know good 
and evil : intoxicate me and free me from knowledge of good and 
evil. 

139 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



ccccxxm 
Oh Lord, have mercy on my captive heart, have mercy on my 
sorrow-laden breast, have mercy on my tavern-turning foot, and on 
my hand that catches at the cup. 



CCCCXXIV 
I am what Thy power fashioned. I have lived a hundred years 
rich in Thy gifts and grace. I would fain live yet one hundred years 
of sin and see in the end if the sum of my faults or Thy pity be the 
greater. 

CCCCXXV 
Say, what man on earth has never sinned ? Say, who could live 
and never sin ? If, therefore, because I do ill You punish me by ill, 
say, then, where is the difference between Thee and me ? 



CCCCXXVI 
Justice is the soul of the world, and the world is a body. The 
angels are its senses, the skies its elements, humanity its limbs. 
This is the eternal unity, all else is delusion. 



ccccxxvn 
The cares of this world are not worth one barley-corn. We are 
happy. If we breakfast we do not dine. We are happy. Naught 
cooked comes to us from the kitchen. We beseech no one. We are 
happy. 

ccccxxvm 

My poor heart, sympathetic and distraught, is deeply drowned in 
the love of my well-beloved. The day the wine of love was poured, 
my share was drawn from the blood of my heart. 

140 



McCarthy version 



ccccxxix 
They bid me drink less wine, and wonder why I will not renounce. 
Why, because the face of my friend is the morning wine. Could 
there be a better reason? 

CCCCXXX 
O thou whose lip is wet with the water of life, do not let the lip of 
the cup come nigh. May I lose my name if I do not slake my ven- 
geance in the blood of the cup that dares to lay its lips to thine. 

CCCCXXXI 
Take cup and flagon in thy hands, beloved, let us hasten to the 
fields and streams, for many maidens lovely as the moon have been 
turned at last into cups and flagons. 

ccccxxxn 

Do not riot in the tavern ; abide there without brawling. Sell your 
turban, sell your Koran to buy wine, then hurry past the mosque 
without going in. 

CCCCXXXIII 
Never wound with sorrow a joyous heart, nor break with the 
stones of torment one moment of delight. Since none can say what 
is to come, our needs are wine, a beloved, and desireful ease. 

CCCCXXXIV 
Some meditate of religions and beliefs, some sway bewildered 
betwixt doubt and knowledge. Suddenly the watcher cries, " Fools, 
your road is not here nor there." 

CCCCXXXV 
Where are ruby lips, jewels of youth ? Where is the scented 
wine that soothes the soul ? It is forbidden by the Moslem creed. 
Drink, for where is the Moslem creed ? 

141 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCCCXXXVI 
O evil-doer, never doing good, who seek shelter with Divinity, 
beware of trusting to be pardoned, for the nothing-doer resembles 
not the doer any more than the doer represents the nothing-doer. 

CCCCXXXVII 
Best to dwell in joy alone, best to take the cup from the fingers of 
the most fair, best the intoxication of the kalendars, best is wine of 
all that lies between the moon and the earth. 

CCCCXXXVIII 
The heaven is a bowl inverted over our heads. The wise are 
shamed and feeble, but the cup and jar are fast friends. They are lip 
to lip though blood flows between them. 



CCCG2 

The drop of water sorrowed to be sundered from the ocean. 
Ocean smiling said, " We are all in all, God is within and around us, 
and we are divided but by an imperceptible point." 

CCCCXL 
Oh, would that there were a place to rest, that by this road we 
might arrive; oh, that after a hundred thousand years we might 
arise anew from the heart of the earth like the green grasses. 

CCCCXLI 
Weep not for this bustling world, call for wine and for your dear, 
for that from which man dropped to-day, he seeks to enter again 
to-morrow. 

CCCCXLII 
Know thyself if thou art wise, and see what thou hast brought 
with thee, and what thou wilt take away. You will not drink for- 
sooth because you must die. Why, whether you drink or no, you 
must die. 

142 



McCarthy version 



ccccxLm 
Let not the weight of the world oppress you, do not vex your soul 
with the thought of those who have passed away, yield not your 
heart save to the fairest of the fair, never lack good wine nor cast 
your life to the wind. 

CCCCXLIV 
Whenever you can get two measures of wine, drink, where-ever 
you may be, for he who acts thus is free from thy scorn or my scorn. 

CCCCXLV 
They bid you drink no wine under penalty of fiery pains on the 
day of reckoning. Nevertheless, the moment in which wine makes 
you happy is better than the rewards of this world or the next. 

CCCCXLVI 
Alas, Fate will not let me live anigh thee, yet I cannot bear to live 
a hair's breadth apart from thee. I dare not share my woes with 
anyone. Oh, hard lot, strange sorrow, fair passion. 

CCCCXLVn 
If you delight in darkening the free heart, wear mourning for your 
wits your whole life long, and be accursed for the fool you are. 

ccccxLvm 

I would that God rebuilt the world anew, and that I might see the 
work begun. I would that God blotted my name from the roll of life, 
or of His bounty made life seem more fair. 

J CCCCXLIX 

Give me a flagon of red wine, a book of verses, a loaf of bread, and 
a little idleness. If with such store I might sit by thy dear side in 
some lonely place, I should deem myself happier than a king in his 
kingdom. 

143 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCCCL 

We trust in Divine Goodness which delivers us from sin and duty, 
for where Thy loving kindness is, he who does not, and he who does 
are equal. 



COCCU 
Be resigned to sorrow if you wish to escape it, do not complain of 
your hurts if you would have them healed. If you would fain taste 
the joys of riches, then thank Providence for your poverty. 



cccciji 
The flowers are full in blossom, O cup-bearer; bring wine and 
quit your prayers, O cup-bearer; ere yet death's angel rises up 
against us, come cup in hand, and be happy awhile with the beloved, 
O cup-bearer. 

CCCCLIII 
Drink wine, dear friend, and delight in your beloved, give smug 
hypocrisy the go-by. Do you follow the law of Mahommed, then 
take a cup of wine from the bowl when Ali plays the cup-bearer. 



CCCCLIV 
In the kitchen of life, you savour only the smoke. How long will 
you study in sorrow the problem of being and not being ? This world 
is loss to those that cling to it. Cast it adrift, and lo ! the loss is 
gain. 

CCCCLV 
Oh, Thou whose essence is unknowable to mind, Thou who heed- 
est neither our faults nor our virtues, I am drunk with sins, but my 
trust in Thee makes me sober, I count upon Thy clemency. 

144 



McCarthy version 



CCCCLVT 
Though we have no wish to vex men in their sleep, to shock the 
night with their despairing cries, still do not pride yourself either on 
your wealth or your comeliness, for a single night may sweep them 
both away. 

CCCCLVn 
If from the first You made me know myself, why after would You 
sunder me from myself? If from the first it was Your purpose to 
abandon me, why did You fling me helpless into the middle of this 
world ? 

CCCCLVIII 
If the ways of the world were but based on imitation, all days 
would be holidays. Were it not for those vain threatenings, every- 
one might live life to his own liking. 



CCCCLIX 
Heart, my heart, if you free yourself from earthly cares, you will 
become pure soul and scale the skies. Then what a shame and 
sorrow to have dwelt on earth ! 



CCCCLX 
O potter, have a care if you are wise, how long will you degrade 
the clay of man ? It is the finger of Feridoun, it is the hand of 
Kai-Khosrou, that you place upon the wheel. What are you 
thinking of? 

CCCCLXI 
If in this life you feasted full, what then ? Suppose the latest of 
your days has come, what then ? If you have lived a hundred happy 
years and have yet a hundred years to live, what then ? 
io l 45 



RUBXlYXT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



ccccLxn 

Knowest thou why the lily and the cypress have such fair renown 
with men? Because the one, with ten tongues, is silent; because 
the other with a hundred hands, keeps them from picking and 
stealing. 

CCCCLXIII 
Behold in the zephyr the robe of the rose expanding, the night- 
ingale delighting in the beauty of the rose ; sit in the shade of the 
rose, for many times this rose from earth has come and unto earth 
has gone. 

CCCCLXIV 
Woe's me for wasted life, for prohibited pleasures, and contam- 
inated bodies. My face is blackened for not having done what Thou 
hast ordered. How then if I had done what Thou hast not ordered ? 



CCCCLXV 
How long shall I vex me with the have or have-not, with wonder- 
ing if I should or should not pass life pleasantly ? Nay, fill the cup, 
my cup-bearer, for in truth I know not if I shall breathe out the 
breath I now breathe in. 

CCCCLXVI 
In this house of life, philosopher, drink red wine, so every atom of 
thy dust which the wind yet shall carry, will fall steeped in wine, on 
the threshold of the tavern. 



X46 



The Quatrains of 
Omar Khayyam 

Translated into English 'Verse by 
E. H. WHINFIELD 

SECOND EDITION, REVISED 



On Reading the Rubaiyat of Omar 
Khayyam in a Kentish Rose Garden 



jyESIDE a Dial in the leafy close, 
Aj Where every bush e was burning with the rose, 
With million roses falling flake by flake 
Upon the lawn in fading summer snows: 

I read the Persian Poet's rhyme of old, 

Each thought a ruby in a ring of gold — 

Old thoughts so young, that, after all these years, 

They 're writ on every rose-leaf yet unrolled. 

You may not know the secret tongue aright 
The Sunbeams on their rosy tablets write; 
Only a poet may perchance translate 
'Those ruby-tinted hieroglyphs of light* 

SMATHILDE 'BLIND. 



149 



THE QUATRAINS OF 
OMAR KHAYYAM 



ALIF 



'^T^ IS but a day we sojourn here below, 

And all the gain we get is grief and woe, 
And then, leaving life's riddles all unsolved, 
And burdened with regrets, we have to go. 



ii 
Khaja ! grant one request, and only one, 
Wish me God-speed, and get your preaching done ; 

I walk aright, 't is you who see awry ; 
Go ! mend your sight, and leave Khayyam alone. 



in 
Arise! and come, and of thy courtesy 
Relieve my weary heart's perplexity, 

And fill my goblet, so that I may drink, 
Or ere they make their goblets out of me. 

151 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



IV 

When I am dead, with wine my body lave, 
For obit chant a bacchanalian stave, 

And, if you need me at the day of doom, 
Beneath the tavern threshold seek my grave. 



v 
Since no one can assure thee of the morrow, 
Rejoice thy heart to-day, and banish sorrow 

With moonbright wine, fair moon, for heaven's moon 
Will look for us in vain on many a morrow. 

VI 

In Allah's name, say, wherefore set the wise 
Their hearts upon this house of vanities? 

Whene'er they think to rest them from their toils, 
Death takes them by the hand, and says, "Arise." 



vn 
Men say the Koran holds all heavenly lore, 
But on its pages seldom care to pore ; 

The lucid lines engraven on the bowl, — 
That is the text they dwell on evermore. 

152 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



VIII 

Blame not the drunkards, you who wine eschew; 
Had I but grace, I would abstain like you ; 

And mark me, vaunting zealot, you commit 
A hundredfold worse sins than drunkards do. 



IX 

What though 't is fair to view, this form of man, 
I know not why the Heavenly Artisan 

Hath set these tulip cheeks and cypress forms 
To deck the mournful halls of earth's divan. 



BE 



x 

So many cups of wine will I consume, 

Its bouquet shall exhale from out my tomb, 

And every one that passes by shall halt, 
And reel and stagger with that mighty fume. 

153 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XI 

Here in this tavern haunt I make my lair, 
Pawning for wine, heart, soul, and all I wear, 

Without a hope of bliss or fear of bale, 
Rapt above water, earth, and fire, and air. 



XII 

Quoth fish to duck, " 'T will be a sad affair 
If this brook leaves its channel dry and bare ; " 

To whom the duck, " When I am dead and roasted, 
The brook may mirage prove for aught I care." 



TE 



xm 
From doubt to clear assurance is a breath, 
A breath from infidelity to faith; 

Oh, precious breath ! enjoy it while you may, 
'Tis all that life can give, and then comes death. 

154 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



XIV 

Ah ! wheel of heaven, to tyranny inclined, 

'T was e'er your wont to show yourself unkind ; 

And, cruel earth, if they should cleave your breast, 
What store of buried jewels they would find ! 



xv 
My life lasts but a day or two, and fast 
Sweeps by, like torrent stream or desert blast, 

Howbeit, of two days I take no heed, — 
The day that 's future, and the day that 's past. 



XVI 

Now that with youth and joy my age is rife, 
I quaff enchanting wine, and list to fife ; 

Chide not at wine for all its bitter taste, 
Its bitterness sorts well with human life ! 



xvn 
O soul ! whose lot it is to bleed with pain, 
And daily change of fortune to sustain, 

Into this body wherefore didst thou come, 
Seeing thou must so soon go forth again? 

155 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



xvni 
To-day is thine to spend, but not to-morrow, 
Counting on morrows breedeth naught but sorrow; 
Oh! squander not this breath that Heaven hath 
lent thee, 
Nor make too sure another breath to borrow! 



'T is labour lost thus to all doors to crawl ; 
Take thy good fortune, and thy bad withal ; 

Know for a surety each must play his game, 
As from the box of fate the dice may fall. 



This jug did once, like me, love's sorrows taste, 
And bonds of beauty's tresses once embraced, 

This handle, which you see upon its side, 
Has many a time twined round a slender waist! 

XXI 

Days changed to nights, ere you were born, or I 
And on its business ever rolled the sky; 

See you tread gently on this dust, perchance 
'T was once the apple of some beauty's eye. 

156 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



Pagodas, just as mosques, are homes of prayer, 
'Tis prayer that church-bells chime unto the air; . 

Yea, Church and Ka'ba, Rosary and Cross, 
Are all but divers tongues of world-wide prayer. 

XXIII 

'Twas writ at first, whatever was to be, 
By pen unheeding bliss or misery, 

Yea, writ upon the tablet once for all ; 
To murmur or resist is vanity. 

xxrv 
Behold these cups ! can He who deigned to make them, 
In wanton freak let ruin overtake them, 

So many shapely feet and hands and heads, — 
What love drives Him to make, what wrath to break 
them? 

xxv 
Death's terrors spring from baseless phantasy, 
Death yields the tree of immortality; 

Since 'Isa breathed new life into my soul, 
Eternal death has washed its hands of me! 

157 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XXVI 

Fate will not bend to humour man's caprice, 
So vaunt not human powers, but hold your peace; 
Here must we stay, weighed down with grief for 
this, 
That we were born so late, so soon decease. 

XXVII 

Khayyam ! why weep you that your life is bad ? 
What boots it thus to mourn? Rather be glad. 

He that sins not can make no claim to mercy; 
Mercy was made for sinners — be not sad. 

xxvm 
All mortal ken is bounded by the veil, 
To see beyond man's sight is all too frail; 

Yea! earth's dark bosom is his only home; — 
Alas! 'twere long to tell the doleful tale. 



In synagogue and cloister, mosque and school, 
Hell's terrors and heaven's lures men's bosoms rule ; 

But they who master Allah's mysteries, 
Sow not this empty chaff their hearts to fool. 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



I dreamt a sage said, " Wherefore life consume 

In sleep? Can sleep make pleasure's roses bloom? 

Forgather not with Death's twin-brother, Sleep ; 
Thou wilt have sleep enough within thy tomb!" 



YYYT 

If the heart knew life's secrets here below, 

At death 'twould know God's secrets too, I trow, 

But, if you know naught here, while still yourself, 
To-morrow, stripped of self, what can you know? 



On that dread day when wrath shall rend the sky, 
And darkness dim the bright stars' galaxy, 

I '11 seize the Loved One by His skirt, and cry, 
" Why hast Thou doomed these guiltless ones to die ? ,! 



xxxm 
To knaves Thy secret we must not confide, 
To comprehend it is to fools denied, 

See then to what hard case Thou doomest men, 
Our hopes from one and all perforce we hide. 

159 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



xxxrv 
Bring wine ! my heart with dancing spirits teems ; 
Wake ! fortune's waking is as fleeting dreams ; 

Quicksilver-like our days are swift of foot, 
And youthful fire subsides like torrent streams. 



xxxv 
My law it is in pleasure's paths to stray, 
My creed to shun the theologic fray; 

I wedded Luck, and offered her a dower, 
She said, " I want none, so thy heart be gay." 



xxxvi 
From mosque an outcast, and to church a foe, 
Allah ! of what clay didst thou form me so ? 

Like sceptic monk or ugly courtesan, 
No hopes have I above, no joys below. 



XXXVII 

Yon turf, fringing the margent of the stream, 
As down upon a cherub's lip might seem, 

Or growth from dust of buried tulip cheeks; 
Tread not that turf with scorn or light esteem! 

1 60 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



XXXVIII 

Hearts with the light of love illumined well, 
Whether in mosque or synagogue they dwell, 

Have their names written in the book of love, 
Unvexed by hopes of heaven or fears of hell. 

xxxix 
In drinking thus it is not my design 
To riot, or transgress the law divine, 

No ! to attain unconsciousness of self 
Is the sole cause I drink me drunk with wine. 

XL 

Drunkards are doomed to hell, so men declare ; 
Believe it not, 'tis but a foolish scare; 

Heaven will be empty as this hand of mine, 
If none who love good drink find entrance there. 1 

XLI 

What is the world ? A caravanserai, 
A pied pavilion of night and day, 

A feast whereat a thousand Jamsheds sat, 
A couch whereon a thousand Bahrams lay. 

1 See Quatrains Printed in Second Edition Only, lxv. 
ix j6i 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XLII 

In these proud halls, where Bahram once held sway, 
The wild roes drop their young and tigers stray ; 

And that imperial hunter in his turn 
To the great hunter Death is fallen a prey. 

XLHI 

Down fall the tears from skies enwrapt in gloom, 
Without this drink the flowers could never bloom ! 

As now these flowers afford delight to me, 
So shall my dust yield flowers, — God knows for whom. 



XLIV 

Some wine, a Houri maid for company, 
A garden by a stream, with minstrelsy; — 

Toil not to find a better Paradise, 
If other Paradise indeed there be ! 



XLV 

Thy body is a tent, which for a space 

Doth the pure soul with royal presence grace ; 

When he departs, comes the tent-pitcher Death, 
Strikes it, and moves to a new halting-place. 

162 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



XLVI 

Khayyam, who long time tents of science wrought, 
Was burnt by trouble, and to ruin brought ; 

Fate's shears have cut his thread of life in twain, 
And Death, the broker, sold him off for naught. 1 

XL VII 

In the sweet spring a grassy bank I sought, 
And thither wine and a fair Houri brought ; 

And, though the people call me graceless dog, 
Gave not to Paradise another thought ! 

XLvni 
Make haste ! soon must you quit this life below, 
And pass the veil, and Allah's secrets know; 

Make haste to take your pleasure while you may, 
You wot not whence you come, nor whither go. 

XLIX 

To chant wine's praises is my daily task, 
I live encompassed by cup, bowl, and flask ; 
Zealot! if reason be thy guide, then know 
That guide of wine doth ofttimes guidance ask. 



1 See FitzGerald Preface. 

163 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



L 

O men of morals ! why do ye defame 

And thus misjudge me ? I am not to blame. 

Save weakness for the grape and Houri's charms, 
What sins of mine can any of ye name ? 



LI 

Skies like a zone our weary lives enclose, 
And from our tear-stained eyes a Jihun flows ; 

Hell is a fire enkindled of our griefs ; 
Heaven but a dream of respite from our woes. 



LII 

I drown in sin — show me Thy clemency! 
My soul is dark — make me Thy light to see ! 

A heaven that must be earned by painful works 
I call a wage, not a gift fair and free. 



Lin 
Did He who made me fashion me for hell, 
Or destine me for heaven ? I cannot tell. 

Yet will I not renounce cup, lute, and love, 
Nor earthly cash for heavenly credit sell. 

164 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



LIV 

The good and evil with man's nature blent, 

The weal and woe that Heaven's decrees have sent, 

Impute them not to motions of the skies, — 
Skies than thyself ten times more impotent. 



LV 

He in whose bosom wisdom's seed is sown, 
To waste a single day is never known ; 

Either he strives to work great Allah's will, 
Or else exalts the cup, and works his own. 

LVI 

When Allah mixed my clay, He knew full well 
My future acts, and could each one foretell ; 

Nothing without His fiat can I do ; 
Is it then just to punish me in hell ? 



lvii 
If grace be grace and Allah gracious be, 
Adam from Paradise why banished He ? 

Grace to poor sinners shown is grace indeed ; 
In grace hard earned by works no grace I see. 

165 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LVHI 

Dame Fortune's smiles are full of guile, beware ! 
Her scimitar is sharp to smite, take care ! 

If e'er she drop a sweetmeat in thy mouth, 
'Tis poisonous, — to swallow it forbear! 



LIX 

Where'er you see a rose or tulip bed, 

Know that a mighty monarch's blood was shed; 

And where the violet rears her purple tuft, 
Be sure a black-moled girl doth rest her head. 



LX 

Wine is a melting ruby, cup its mine ; 
Cup is the body and the soul is wine ; 

These goblets smile with wine of ruddy hue, 
Like tears, that blood of wounded hearts enshrine. 



LXI 

Drink wine ! long must you sleep within the tomb, 
Without a friend, or wife to cheer your gloom ; 

Hear what I say, and tell it not again, 
" Never again can withered tulips bloom." 

1 66 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



Lxn 
They preach how sweet those Houri brides will be, 
But I say wine is sweeter — taste and see ! 

Hold fast this cash, and let that credit go, 
And shun the din of empty drums like me. 



T.XTTI 

Once and again my soul did me implore, 
To teach her, if I might, the heavenly lore ; 

I bade her learn the cAlif well by heart. 
Who knows that letter well need learn no more. 



lxtv 
I came not hither of my own free-will, 
And go against my wish, a puppet still ; 

Cupbearer ! gird thy loins, and fetch some wine ; 
To purge the world's despite, my goblet fill. 



LXV 

Sweet is the breath of spring to rose's face, 

And thy sweet face adds charm to this fair place; 

To-day is sweet, but yesterday is sad, 
And sad all mention of its parted grace. 

167 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LXVI 

To-night pour wine, and sing a dulcet air, 
And I upon thy lips will hang, O fair ; 

Yea, pour some wine as rosy as thy cheeks, 
My mind is troubled like thy ruffled hair. 

Lxvn 
Pen, tablet, heaven and hell I looked to see 
Above the skies from all eternity; 

At last the master-sage instructed me, 
" Pen, tablet, heaven and hell are all in thee." 

Lxvin 
The fruit of certitude he cannot pluck, 
The path that leads thereto who never struck, 

Nor ever shook the bough with strenuous hand ; 
To-day is lost ; hope for to-morrow's luck. 

LXIX 

Now spring-tide showers its foison on the land, 
And lively hearts wend forth, a joyous band, 

For 'Isa's 1 breath wakes the dead earth to life, 
And trees gleam white with flowers, like Musa's 2 hand, 



1 Jesus. 2 Moses. 

168 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



LXX 

Alas for that cold heart, which never glows 

With love, nor e'er that charming madness knows ; 

The days misspent with no redeeming love ; — 
No days are wasted half so much as those ! 

LXXI 

The Master did himself these vessels frame, 
Why should he cast them out to scorn and shame ? 
If he has made them well, why should he break 
them? 
Yea, though he marred them, they are not to blame. 



KHE 

LXXII 

When life is spent, what's Balkh or Nishapore 
What sweet or bitter, when the cup runs o'er? 

Come drink ! full many a moon will wax and wane 
In times to come, when we are here no more. 

169 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



DAL 

LXXIII 

Life's caravan is hastening on its way ; 
Brood not on troubles of the coming day, 

But fill the wine-cup, ere sweet night be gone, 
And snatch a pleasant moment, while you may. 



lxxtv 
He, who the world's foundations erst did lay, 
Doth bruise full many a bosom day by day, 

And many a ruby lip and musky tress 
Doth coffin in the earth, and shroud with clay. 



LXXV 

Comrades ! I pray you, physic me with wine, 
Make this wan amber face like rubies shine, 

And, if I die, use wine to wash my corpse, 
And frame my coffin out of planks of vine ! 

170 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



LXXVI 

When Allah yoked the coursers of the sun, 
And launched the Pleiades their race to run, 

My lot was fixed in fate's high chancery ; 
Then why blame me for wrong that fate has done ? 

LXXVII 

Whilom, ere youth's conceit had waned, methought 
Answers to all life's problems I had wrought; 
But now, grown old and wise, too late I see 
My life is spent, and all my lore is naught. 

LXXVIII 

He brought me hither, and I felt surprise, 
From life I gather but a dark surmise, 

I go against my will ; — thus, why I come, 
Why live, why go, are all dark mysteries. 

Lxxrx 

They at whose lore the whole world stands amazed, 

Whose high thoughts, like Borak, to heaven are raised, 

Strive to know Thee in vain, and like heaven's 

wheel, 

Their heads are turning, and their brains are dazed. 

171 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LXXX 

The sages who have compassed sea and land, 
Their secret to search out, and understand, — 

My mind misgives me if they ever solve 
The scheme on which this universe is planned. 



LXXXI 

Ah ! wealth takes wings, and leaves our hands all bare, 
And death's rough hands delight our hearts to tear; 

And from the nether world let none escape, 
To bring us tidings of the pilgrims there. 



LXXXII 

The wheel on high, still busied with despite, 
Will ne'er unloose a wretch from his sad plight; 

But when it lights upon a smitten heart, 
Straightway essays another blow to smite. 



LXXXIII 

Now is the volume of my youth outworn, 
And all my spring-tide blossoms rent and torn. 

Ah, bird of youth ! I marked not when you came, 
Nor when you fled, and left me thus forlorn. 

172 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



Lxxxrv 
These fools, by dint of ignorance most crass, 
Think they in wisdom all mankind surpass ; 

And glibly do they damn as infidel 
Whoever is not, like themselves, an ass. 



LXXXV 

Till the Friend pours his wine to glad my heart, 
No kisses to my face will heaven impart: 

They say, " Repent in time ; " but how repent, 
Ere Allah's grace hath softened my hard heart? 



LXXXVI 

When I am dead, take me and grind me small, 
So that I be a warning unto all, 

And knead me into clay with wine, and then 
Use me to stop the wine-jar's mouth withal. 



LXXXVH 

What though the sky with its blue canopy 
Doth close us in so that we cannot see, 

In the etern Cupbearer's wine, methinks, 
There float a myriad bubbles like to me. 

173 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LXXXVIII 

Needs must the tavern-haunter bathe in wine, 
For none can make a tarnished name to shine ; 
Go ! bring me wine, for none can now restore 
Its pristine sheen to this soiled robe of mine. 



LXXXIX 

Let him rejoice who has a loaf of bread, 
A little nest wherein to lay his head, 

Is slave to none, and no man slaves for him, 
In truth his lot is wondrous well bested. 



xc 
What adds my service to Thy majesty? 
Or how can sin of mine dishonour Thee? 
O pardon, then, and punish not, I know 
Thou'rt slow to wrath, and prone to clemency. 



xci 
Hands, such as mine, that handle bowls of wine, 
'Twere shame to book and pulpit to confine; 

Zealot ! thou 'rt dry, and I am moist with drink. 
Yea, far too moist to catch that fire of thine! 

174 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



XCII 

For ever may my hands on wine be stayed, 
And my heart pant for some fair Houri maid ! 
They say, " May Allah aid thee to repent ! " 
Repent I could not, e'en with Allah's aid ! 



xcm 
To-day how sweetly breathes the temperate air, 
The rains have newly laved the parched parterre ; 

And Bulbuls cry in notes of ecstasy, 
" Thou too, O pallid rose, our wine must share." 



xcrv 
Ere you succumb to shocks of mortal pain, 
The rosy grape-juice from your wine-cup drain. 

You are not gold, that, hidden in the earth, 
Your friends should care to dig you up again ! 



xcv 
My coming brought no profit to the sky, 
Nor does my going swell its majesty ; 

Coming and going put me to a stand, 
Ear never heard their wherefore nor their why. 

175 



RUBAlYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



XCVI 

The heavenly Sage, whose wit exceeds compare, 
Counteth each vein, and numbereth every hair ; 

Men you may cheat by hypocritic arts, 
But how cheat Him to whom all hearts are bare ? 



XCVTI 

Ah ! wine lends wings to many a weary wight, 
And beauty spots to ladies' faces bright; 
All Ramazan I have not drunk a drop, 
Thrice welcome then, O Bairam's blessed night! 



xcvm 
To prayer and fasting when my heart inclined, 
All my desire I surely hoped to find; 

Alas ! my purity is stained with wine, 
My prayers are wasted like a breath of wind. 



xcrx 
Why spend life in vainglorious essay 
All Being and Not-being to survey? 

Since Death is ever pressing at your heels, 
'Tis best to drink or dream your life away. 

176 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



c 
Some hanker after that vain phantasy 
Of Houris, feigned in Paradise to be ; 

But, when the veil is lifted, they will find 
How far they are from Thee, how far from Thee ! 



ci 
In Paradise, they tell us, Houris dwell, 
And fountains run with wine and oxymel : 
If these be lawful in the world to come, 
Surely 't is right to love them here as well. 



en 
A draught of wine would make a mountain dance, 
Base is the churl who looks at wine askance ; 

Wine is a soul our bodies to inspire, 
A truce to this vain talk of temperance ! 



cm 
Oft doth my soul her prisoned state bemoan, 
Her earth-born comate she would fain disown, 

And quit, did not the stirrup of the law 
Upbear her foot from dashing on the stone. 
12 177 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CIV 

What sage the eternal tangle e'er unravelled, 
Or one short step beyond his nature travelled? 

From pupils to the masters turn your eyes, 
And see, each mother's son alike is gravelled. 



cv 
Crave not of worldly sweets to take your fill, 
Nor wait on turns of fortune, good or ill ; 
Be of light heart, as are the skies above, 
They roll their destined rounds, and then lie still. 



cvi 
What eye can pierce the veil of God's decrees, 
Or read the riddle of earth's destinies? 

Pondered have I for years threescore and ten, 
But still am baffled by these mysteries. 



cvn 
They say, when the last trump shall sound its knell, 
The Friend will sternly judge, and doom to hell. 

Can aught but good from perfect goodness come ? 
Compose your trembling hearts, 'twill all be well. 

178 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



cvin 
Drink wine to root up metaphysic weeds, 
And tangle of the two-and-seventy creeds ; 
Do not forswear that wondrous alchemy, 
'T will turn to gold, and cure a thousand needs. 

cix 
Though drink is wrong, take care with whom you 

drink, 
And who you are that drink, and what you drink ; 

And drink at will, for, these three points observed, 
Who but the very wise can ever drink? 

ex 
To drain a gallon beaker I design, 
Yea, two great beakers, brimmed with richest wine ; 

Old faith and reason thrice will I divorce, 
Then take to wife the daughter of the vine. 

CXI 

True I drink wine, like every man of sense, 
For I know Allah will not take offence ; 

Before time was, He knew that I should drink, 
And who am I to thwart His prescience ? 

179 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CXII 

When false dawn streaks the east with cold grey line, 
Pour in your cups the pure blood of the vine ; 

The truth, they say, tastes bitter in the mouth, 
This is a token that the "Truth" is wine. 



cxni 
Now is the time earth decks her greenest bowers, 
And trees, like Musa's hand, grow white with flowers ! 

As 't were at 'Isa's breath the plants revive, 
While clouds brim o'er, like tearful eyes, with showers. 



cxrv 
The showers of grape-juice, which cupbearers pour, 
Quench fires of grief in many a sad heart's core ; 

Praise be to Allah, who hath sent this balm 
To heal sore hearts, and spirits' health restore ! 



cxv 
Can alien Pharisees Thy kindness tell, 
Like us, Thy intimates, who nigh Thee dwell? 

Thou say'st, " All sinners will I burn with fire. 
Say that to strangers, we know Thee too well. 

180 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CXVI 

O comrades dear, when hither ye repair, 

In times to come, communion sweet to share, 

While the cupbearer pours your old Magh wine, 
Call poor Khayyam to mind, and breathe a prayer. 



CXVII 

For me heaven's sphere no music ever made, 
Nor yet with soothing voice my fears allayed 
If e'er I found brief respite from my woes, 
Back to woe's thrall I was at once betrayed. 



cxvni 
Sooner with half a loaf contented be, 
And water from a broken crock, like me, 
Than lord it over one poor fellow-man, 
Or to another bow the vassal knee. 



cxix 
While Moon and Venus in the sky shall dwell, 
None shall see aught red grape-juice to excel : 

O foolish publicans, what can you buy 
One half so precious as the goods you sell? 

181 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



cxx 
They who endowed with wit and strength of brain, 
As Guiding Lights men's homage did obtain, 

Not even they emerged from this dark night, 
But told their dreams, and fell asleep again. 



cxxi 
At dawn, when dews bedeck the tulip's face, 
And violets their heavy heads abase, 

I love to see the roses' folded buds, 
With petals closed against the winds' disgrace. 



cxxn 
Ah ! thou hast snared this head, though white as snow, 
Which oft has vowed the wine-cup to forego ; 

And wrecked the mansion long resolve did build, 
And rent the vesture penitence did sew ! 



CXXIII 

I am not one whom Death doth much dismay, 
Life's terrors all Death's terrors far outweigh ; 

This life, that Heaven hath lent me for a while, 
I will pay back, when it is time to pay. 

182 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CXXIV 

The stars, who dwell on heaven's exalted stage, 
Baffle the wise diviners of our age ; 

Take heed, hold fast the rope of mother wit, 
These augurs all mistrust their own presage. 



cxxv 
Slaves of vain wisdom and philosophy, 
Who toil at Being and Nonentity, 

Parching your brains till they are like dry grapes, 
Be wise in time, and drink grape-juice, like me ! 



cxxvi 
Sense, seeking happiness, bids us pursue 
All present joys, and present griefs eschew; 

She says, we are not like the meadow grass, 
Which, when they mow it down, springs up anew. 



CXXVII 

My comrades all are gone ; Death, deadly foe, 
Hath caught them one by one, and trampled low ; 

They shared life's feast, and drank its wine with me, 
But lost their heads, and dropped a while ago. 

183 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



cxxvm 
When the great Founder moulded me of old, 
He mixed much baser metal with my gold ; 

Better or fairer I can never be 
Than when I issued from his heavenly mould. 



cxxrx 
The joyous souls who quaff potations deep, 
And saints who in the mosque sad vigils keep, 

Are lost at sea alike, and find no shore, 
One only wakes, all others are asleep. 



cxxx 
Small gains to learning on this earth accrue, 
They pluck life's fruitage, learning who eschew; 
Take pattern by the fools who learning shun, 
And then perchance shall fortune smile on you. 



c: 

Comrades ! when e'er ye meet together here, 
Recall your friend to mind, and drop a tear; 

And when the circling wine-cups reach his seat, 
Let one be overturned his dust to cheer. 

184 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



cxxxn 
Many have come, and run their eager race, 
Striving for pleasures, luxuries, or place, 

And quaffed their wine, and now all silent lie, 
Enfolded in their parent earth's embrace. 



RE 



cxxxni 
Heaven multiplies our sorrows day by day, 
And grants no joys it does not take away ; 

If those unborn could know the ills we bear, 
What think you, would they rather come or stay? 



cxxxiv 
Why ponder thus the future to foresee, 
And jade thy brain to vain perplexity? 

Cast off thy care, leave Allah's plans to him, 
He formed them all without consulting thee. 

* 8 5 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



cxxxv 
The tenants of the tombs to dust decay, 
Nescient of self, and all beside are they ; 

Their crumbling atoms float about the world, 
Like mirage clouds, until the judgment-day. 



cxxxvi 
O soul ! lay up all earthly goods in store, 
Thy mead with pleasure's flowerets spangle o'er ; 

And know 't is all as dew, that decks the flowers 
For one short night, and then is seen no more ! 



cxxxvn 
Heed not the Sunna, nor the law divine ; 
If to the poor his portion you assign, 

And never injure one, nor yet abuse, 
I guarantee you heaven, and now some wine ! 



CXXXVIII 

The world is baffled in its search for Thee, 
Wealth cannot find Thee, no, nor poverty ; 

All speak of Thee, but none have ears to hear, 
Thou 'rt near to all, but none have eyes to see. 

186 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CXXXIX 

Take care you never hold a drinking bout 
With an ill-tempered, ill-conditioned lout ; 

He '11 make a vile disturbance all night long, 
And vile apologies next day, no doubt. 



CXL 

The starry aspects are not all benign ; 
Why toil then after vain desires, and pine 

To lade thyself with load of fortune's boons, 
Only to drop it with this life of thine ? 



CXLI 

I saw a busy potter by the way 

Kneading with might and main a lump of clay; 

And, lo ! the clay cried, " Use me tenderly, 
I was a man myself but yesterday ! " 



CXLII 

Deep in the rondure of the heavenly blue, 
There is a cup, concealed from mortals' view, 

Which all must drink in turn ; O sigh not then, 
But drink it boldly, when it comes to you ! 

187 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



ZE 



CXLHI 

O heart ! this world is but a fleeting show, 
Why should its empty griefs distress thee so ? 

Bow down and bear thy fate, the eternal pen 
Will not unwrite its roll for thee, I trow! 



CXLIV 

Who e'er returned of all that went before, 
To tell of that long road they travel o'er? 

Leave naught undone of what you have to do, 
For when you go, you will return no more. 



CXLV 

In taverns better far commune with Thee, 
Than pray in mosques, and fail Thy face to see ! 

O first and last of all Thy creatures Thou ; 
'T is Thine to burn, and Thine to cherish me ! 

1 88 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CXLVI 

I flew here, as a wandering bird in aim 
Up to a higher nest my course to frame; 

But, finding here no guide who knows the way, 
Fly out by the same door where through I came. 



CXLVII 

He binds us in resistless Nature's chain, 
And yet bids us our natures to restrain ; 

Between these counter rules we stand perplexed, 
" Hold the jar slant, but all the wine retain." 



CXLVIII 

They go away, and none is seen returning, 
To teach that other world's recondite learning ; 

'T will not be shown for dull mechanic prayers, 
For prayer is naught without true heartfelt yearning. 



CXLIX 

Go to ! Cast dust on those deaf skies, who spurn 
Thy orisons and bootless prayers, and learn 

To quaff the cup, and hover round the fair; 
Of all who go, did ever one return? 

189 



RUBXlYXT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CL 

Though Khayyam strings no pearls of righteous deeds, 
Nor roots from out his soul sin's noisome weeds, 

Yet will he not despair of heavenly grace, 
Seeing that one as two he ne'er misreads. 

CLI 

We are but chessmen, destined, it is plain, 
That great chess player, Heaven, to entertain; 
It moves us on life's chess-board to and fro, 
And then in death's box shuts us up again. 

CLII 

I put my lips to the cup, for I did yearn 
The means of gaining length of days to learn ; 
It leaned its lip to mine, and whispered low, 
" Drink ! for, once gone, you never will return." 



190 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



SIN 



CLIII 

At Tus a bird perched in the ruined street 
And on the skull of Kawus set his feet, 

And thus he made his moan, "Alas, poor king! 
Thy bells are hushed, thy drums have ceased to beat." 



CLIV 

What launched that golden orb his course to run, 
What wrecks his firm foundations, when 'tis done, 

No man of science ever weighed with scales, 
Nor made assay with touchstone, no, not one! 



191 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



SHIN 



CLV 

I pray thee to my counsel lend thine ear, 
Cast off this false hypocrisy's veneer ; 

This life a moment is, the next all time, 
Sell not eternity for earthly gear! 



CLVI 

Khayyam ! rejoice that wine you still can pour, 
And still the charms of tulip cheeks adore ; 

You'll soon not be, rejoice then that you are, 
Think how 't would be in case you were no more ! 



CLVII 

Once, in a potter's shop, a company 
Of cups in converse did I chance to see, 

And lo ! one lifted up his voice, and cried, 
" Who made, who sells, who buys this pottery ? " 

192 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CLVIII 

Although the creeds number some seventy-three, 
I hold with none but that of loving Thee ; 

What matter faith, unfaith, obedience, sin ? 
Thou 'rt all we need, the rest is vanity. 



CLIX 

Tell one by one my scanty virtues o'er ; 
As for my sins, forgive them by the score ; 

Let not my faults kindle Thy wrath to flame ; 
By blest Muhammad's tomb, forgive once more ! 



CLX 

There is a chalice made with art profound, 
With tokens of the Maker's favour crowned ; 
Yet the great Potter takes his masterpiece, 
And dashes it to pieces on the ground ! 



13 193 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



FE 



CLXI 

In truth wine is a spirit thin as air, 

A limpid soul in the cup's earthen ware; 

No dull dense person shall be friend of mine 
Save wine-cups, which are dense and also rare. 



KAF 



CLXH 

O wheel of heaven ! no ties of bread you feel, 
No ties of salt, you flay me like an eel ! 

A woman's wheel spins clothes for man and wife, 
It does more good than you, O heavenly wheel ! 

194 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CLXIII 

Did no fair rose my paradise adorn, 

I would make shift to deck it with a thorn ; 

And if I lacked my prayer-mats, beads, and Shaikh, 
Those Christian bells and stoles I would not scorn. 



CLXIV 

"If heaven deny me peace and fame," I said, 
" Let it be open war and shame instead ; 

The man who scorns bright wine had best beware, 
I'll arm me with a stone, and break his head!" 



CLXV 

See ! the dawn breaks, and rends night's canopy : 
Arise ! and drain a morning draught with me ! 

Away with gloom ! full many a dawn will break 
Looking for us, and we not here to see ! 



195 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



LAM 



CLXVI 

Give me my cup in hand, and sing a glee 
In concert with the bulbuls' symphony; 

Wine would not gurgle as it leaves the flask, 
If drinking mute were right for thee and me ! 

CLXVII 

The " Truth" will not be shown to lofty thought, 
Nor yet with lavished gold may it be bought; 

Till self be mortified for fifty years, 
From words to "states" of heart you'll not be 
brought. 

CLXVIII 

I solved all problems, down from Saturn's wreath 
Unto this lowly sphere of earth beneath, 

And leapt out free from bonds of fraud and lies, 
Yea, every knot was loosed, save that of death ! 

196 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CLXIX 

Peace! the eternal "Has been" and "To be' 
Pass man's experience, and man's theory; 

In joyful seasons naught can vie with wine, 
To all these riddles wine supplies the key! 



MIM 



CLXX 

Allah, our Lord, is merciful, though just ; 
Sinner ! despair not, but His mercy trust ! 

For though to-day you perish in your sins, 
To-morrow He '11 absolve your crumbling dust. 

CLXXI 

Your course annoys me, O ye wheeling skies ! 
Unloose me from your chain of tyrannies ! 

If none but fools your favours may enjoy, 
Then favour me, — I am not very wise ! 

197 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CLXXII 

When Khayyam quittance at Death's hand receives, 
And sheds his outworn life, as trees their leaves, 

Full gladly will he sift this world away, 
Ere dustmen sift his ashes in their sieves. 

CLXXIII 

This wheel of heaven, which makes us all afraid, 
I liken to a lamp's revolving shade, 

The sun the candlestick, the earth the shade, 
And men the trembling forms thereon portrayed. 

CLXXIV 

Who was it that did mix my clay? Not I. 
Who spun my web of silk and wool ? Not I. 
Who wrote upon my forehead all my good, 
And all my evil deeds ? In truth not I. 

CLXXV 

O let us not forecast to-morrow's fears, 
But count to-day as gain, my brave compeers ! 
To-morrow we shall quit this inn, and march 
With comrades who have marched seven thousand 
years. 

198 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CLXXVI 

Ne'er for one moment leave your cup unused ! 
Wine keeps heart, faith, and reason too, amused; 

Had Iblis swallowed but a single drop, 
To worship Adam he had ne'er refused ! 



CLXXVII 

Ah ! by these heavens, that ever circling run, 
And by my own base lusts I am undone, 

Without the wit to abandon worldly hopes, 
And wanting sense the world's allures to shun ! 



CLxxvm 
On earth's green carpet many sleepers lie, 
And hid beneath it others I descry ; 

And others, not yet come, or passed away, 
People the desert of Nonentity! 



clxxix 
Sure of Thy grace, for sins why need I fear? 
How can the pilgrim faint whilst Thou art near? 
On the last day Thy grace will wash me white, 
And make my " black record" to disappear. 

199 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CLXXX 

Think not I dread from out the world to hie, 
And see my disembodied spirit fly ; 

I tremble not at death, for death is true, 
'T is my ill life that makes me fear to die! 



CLXXXI 

Let us shake off dull reason's incubus, 
Our tale of days or years cease to discuss, 

And take our jugs, and plenish them with wine, 
Or ere grim potters make their jugs of us ! 



CLXXXII 

How much more wilt thou chide, O raw divine, 
For that I drink, and am a libertine ? 

Thou hast thy weary beads, and saintly show, 
Leave me my cheerful sweetheart, and my wine ! 



CLXXXIII 

Against my lusts I ever war, in vain, 

I think of my ill deeds with shame and pain; 

I trust Thou wilt assoil me of my sins, 
But even so, my shame must still remain. 

200 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



clxxxiv 
In these twin compasses, O Love, you see 
One body with two heads, like you and me, 

Which wander round one centre, circlewise, 
But at the last in that one point agree. 



crxxxv 
We shall not stay here long, but while we do, 
'T is folly wine and sweethearts to eschew ; 

Why ask if earth etern or transient be ? 
Since you must go, it matters not to you. 



CLXXXVI 

In reverent sort to mosque I wend my way, 
But, by great Allah, it is not to pray ; 

No ! but to steal a prayer-mat ! When 't is worn, 
I go again, another to purvey. 



CLXXXVII 

The world is false, so I '11 be false as well, 
And with bright wine, and gladness ever dwell ! 
They say, " May Allah grant thee penitence ! " 
He grants it not, and did he, I 'd rebel ! 

201 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CLXxxvni 
When death shall tread me down and pluck me bare, 
Like some fat capon, or poor chanticlere ; 

Then mould me to a cup, and fill with wine ; 
Its perfume will revive me then and there. 



CLXXXIX 

So far as this world's dealings I have traced, 
I find its favours shamefully misplaced; 

Allah be praised ! I see myself debarred 
From all its boons, and wrongfully disgraced. 



cxc 
'Tis dawn! my heart with wine I will recruit, 
And dash to bits the glass of good repute ; 
My long-extending hopes I will renounce, 
And grasp long tresses, and the charming lute. 



cxci 
Though I had sinned the sins of all mankind, 
I know Thou would'st to mercy be inclined ; 

Thou sayest, " I will help in time of need:" 
One needier than me where wilt Thou find ? 

202 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



cxcn 
Am I a wine-bibber ? What if I am ? 
Giaour, or infidel ? Suppose I am ? 

Each sect miscalls me, but I heed them not, 
I am my own, and, what I am, I am. 

cxcm 
All my life long to drink I have not ceased, 
And drink I will to-night on Kader's feast; 

And throw my arms about the wine-jar's neck, 
And kiss its lip, and clasp it to my breast! 



cxciv 
I know what is, and what is not, I know 
The lore of things above, and things below, 
But all this lore will cheerfully renounce, 
If one a higher lore than drink can show. 



cxcv 
Though I drink wine, I am no libertine, 
Nor am I grasping, save of cups of wine ; 

I scruple to adore myself, like you ; 
For this cause to wine-worship I incline. 

203 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CXCVI 

We make the wine-jar's lip our place of prayer, 
And drink in lessons of true manhood there, 
And pass our lives in taverns, if perchance 
The time misspent in mosques we may repair. 



cxcvn 
Man is the whole creation's summary, 
The precious apple of great wisdom's eye; 

The circle of existence is a ring, 
Whereof the signet is humanity. 



CXCVIII 

With fancies, as with wine, our heads we turn, 
Aspire to heaven, and earth's low trammels spurn ; 

But, when we drop this fleshly clog, 't is seen 
From dust we came, and back to dust return. 



cxcix 
I never drank of joy's sweet cordial, 
But grief's fell hand infused a drop of gall ; 

Nor dipped my bread in pleasure's piquant salt, 
But briny sorrow made me smart withal ! 

204 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



cc 
At dawn to tavern haunts I wend my way, 
And with distraught Kalendars pass the day; 

Thou! who know'st things secret, and things 

known, 
Grant me Thy grace, that I may learn to pray ! 

cci 
Never from worldly toils have I been free, 
Never for one short moment glad to be ! 

1 served a long apprenticeship to fate, 
But yet of fortune gained no mastery. 

ecu 
One hand with Koran, one with wine-cup dight, 
I half incline to wrong, and half to right; 

The azure-marbled sky looks down on me 
A sorry Moslem, yet not heathen quite. 

CCIII 

My critics call me a philosopher, 

But Allah knows full well they greatly err ; 

I know not even what I am, much less 
Why on this earth I am a sojourner! 

205 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



ccrv 
Quoth rose, " I am the Yusuf flower, I swear, 
For in my mouth rich golden gems I bear:" 

I said, " Show me another proof." Quoth she 
" Behold this blood-stained vesture that I wear ! ; 



ccrv 
I studied with the masters long ago, 
And long ago did master all they know ; 
Hear now the end and issue of it all, 
From earth I came, and like the wind I go ! 



ccvi 
To find great Jamshed's world-reflecting bowl 
I compassed sea and land, and viewed the whole ; 

But, when I asked the wary sage, I learned 
That bowl was my own body, and my soul ! 



gcvti 
Me, cruel Queen ! you ever captivate, 
From valiant knight to puny pawn translate ; 

And marshal all your force and ply your arts, 
To take my castles, and myself checkmate ! 

206 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CCVIII 

If Allah wills me not to will aright, 
How can I frame my will to will aright ? 

Each single act I will must needs be wrong, 
Since none but He can make me will aright. 



ccix 
Endure this world without my wine I cannot ! 
Drag on life's load without my cups I cannot! 
I am the slave of that sweet moment, when 
They say, "Take one more goblet," and I cannot! 



NUN 



ccx 
Make light to me the world's oppressive weight, 
And hide my failings from the people's hate, 

And grant me peace to-day, and on the morrow 
Deal with me as Thy mercy may dictate ! 

207 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCXI 

Souls that are well informed of this world's state, 
Its weal and woe with equal mind await, 
For, be it weal we meet, or be it woe, 
The weal doth pass, and woe too hath its date. 

CCXII 

Lament not fortune's want of constancy, 
But up ! and seize her favours ere they flee ; 

If fortune always cleaved to other men, 
How could a turn of luck have come to thee? 

CCXIII 

Chief of old friends ! hearken to what I say, 
Let not heaven's treacherous wheel your heart 
dismay ; 
But rest contented in your humble nook, 
And watch the games that wheel is wont to play. 

ccxiv 
Hear now Khayyam's advice, and bear in mind, 
Consort with revellers, though they be maligned, 

Cast down the gates of abstinence and prayer, 
Yea, drink, and even rob, but, aye be kind ! 

208 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



ccxv 
Have you no shame for all the sins you do, 
Sins of omission and commission too ? 

Suppose you gain the world, you can but leave it, 
You cannot carry it away with you ! 



ccxvi 
Some look for truth in creeds, and forms, and rules 
Some grope for doubts or dogmas in the schools ; 

But from behind the veil a voice proclaims, 
"Your road lies neither here nor there, O fools." 



ccxvn 
Had I the power great Allah to advise, 
I 'd bid him sweep away this earth and skies, 

And build a better, where, unclogged and free, 
The clear soul might achieve her high emprise. 



ccxvm 
To drain the cup, to hover round the fair, 
Can hypocritic arts with these compare ? 

If all who love and drink are going wrong, 
There 's many a wight of heaven may well despair I 
14 209 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCXIX 

'T is well in reputation to abide, 

'T is shameful against heaven to rail and chide ; 

Still, head had better ache with over drink, 
Than be puffed up with Pharisaic pride! 



ccxx 
O Lord ! from self-conceit deliver me, 
Sever from self, and occupy with Thee ! 

This self is captive to earth's good and ill, 
Make me beside myself, and set me free ! 



ccxxi 
Since all man's business in this world of woe 
Is sorrow's pangs to feel, and grief to know, 

Happy are they that never come at all, 
And they that, having come, are first to go ! 

ccxxn 
Nor you nor I can read the etern decree, 
To that enigma we can find no key; 

They talk of you and me behind the veil, 
But, sweep that veil away, and where are <we ? 

210 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



WAW 



CCXXIII 

O Love, for ever doth heaven's "wheel design 
To take away thy precious life, and mine ; 
Sit we upon this turf, 'twill not be long 
Ere turf shall grow upon my dust, and thine ! 



ccxxiv 
Yon palace, towering to the welkin blue, 
Where kings did bow them down, and homage do, 

I saw a ringdove on its arches perched, 
And thus she made complaint, " Coo Coo, Coo, Coo ! " 



ccxxv 
We come and go, but for the gain, where is it? 
And spin life's woof, but for the warp, where is it? 

And many a righteous man has burned to dust 
'Neath heaven's blue rondure, but their smoke, where 
is it? 

211 



RUBAlYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCXXVI 

Such as I am, Thy power created me, 
Thy care hath kept me for a century ! 

Through all these years I make experiment, 
If my sins or Thy mercy greater be. 



ccxxvn 
"Take up thy cup and goblet, Love," I said, 
" Haunt purling river bank, and grassy glade ; 

Full many a moon-like form has heaven's wheel 
Oft into cup, oft into goblet, made ! " 

ccxxvm 
We buy new wine and old, our cups to fill, 
And sell for two grains this world's good and ill; 

Know you where you will go to after death? 
Set wine before me, and go where you will ! 

CCXXIX 

Was e'er man born who never went astray? 
Did ever mortal pass a sinless day? 
If I do ill, do not requite with ill ! 
Evil for evil how canst Thou repay? 

212 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CC2 

Man, like a ball, hither and thither goes, 
As fate's resistless bat directs the blows ; 

But He, who gives thee up to this rude sport, 
He knows what drives thee, yea, He knows, He 
knows ! 

ccxxxi 
Let not base avarice enslave thy mind, 
Nor vain ambition in its trammels bind ; 

Be sharp as fire, as running water swift, 
Not like earth's dust, the sport of every wind ! 



HE 



ccxxxn 
O Thou who hast done ill, and ill alone, 
And thinkest to find mercy at the throne, 

Hope not for mercy ! for good left undone 
Cannot be done, nor evil done undone ! 

213 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



ccxxxni 
These heavens, methinks, are like an o'erturned cup, 
Whereto the wise with awe keep gazing up ; 
So o'er his love, the cup, the bottle stoops, 
Feigning to kiss, and gives her blood to sup I 



ccxxxrv 
The drop wept for his severance from the sea, 
But the sea smiled, for " I am all," said he, 

" The Truth is all in all, there 's naught beside, 
That one point circling apes plurality." 



ccxxxv 
Bulbuls, doting on roses, oft complain 
How froward breezes rend their veils in twain; 
Sit we beneath this rose, which many a time 
Has dropped to earth, and sprung from earth again. 

ccxxxvi 
Alas ! my wasted life has gone to wrack ! 
What with forbidden meats, and lusts, alack ! 
And leaving undone what 'twas right to do, 
And doing wrong, my face is very black ! 

214 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



I could repent of all, but of wine, never! 

I could dispense with all, but with wine, never ! 

If so be I became a Musulman, 
Could I abjure my Magian wine? no, never! 



CCXXXVIII 

We rest our hopes on Thy free grace alone, 
Nor seek by merits for our sins to atone ; 

Mercy drops where it lists, and estimates 
111 done as undone, good undone as done. 



ccxxxix 
O unenlightened race of humankind, 
Ye are a nothing, built on empty wind ! 

Yea, a mere nothing, hovering in the abyss, 
A void before you, and a void behind! 

CCXL 

Vain study of philosophy eschew ! 
Rather let tangled curls attract your view ; 

And shed the bottle's life-blood in your cup, 
Or e'er death shed your blood, and feast on you. 

2i5 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



YE 



CCXLI 

O Heart! canst thou the darksome riddle read, 
Where wisest men have failed, wilt thou succeed? 

Quaff wine, and make thy heaven here below, 
Who knows if heaven above will be thy meed? 



CCXLII 

They that have passed away, and gone before, 
Sleep in delusion's dust for evermore ; 

Go, boy, and fetch some wine, this is the truth, 
Their dogmas were but air, and wind their lore ! 



CCXLIII 

With many a snare Thou dost beset my way, 
And threatenest, if I fall therein, to slay ; 

Thy rule resistless sways the world, yet Thou 
Imputest sin, when I do but obey ! 

216 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CCXLIV 

To Thee, whose essence baffles human thought, 
Our sins and righteous deeds alike seem naught ; 

May Thy grace sober me, though drunk with sins, 
And pardon all the ill that I have wrought ! 



CCXLV 

O soul ! could you but doff this flesh and bone, 
You 'd soar a sprite about the heavenly throne ; 
Had you no shame to leave your starry home, 
And dwell an alien on this earthy zone ? 



CCXLVI 

Ah, potter, stay thine hand ! with ruthless art 
Put not to such base use man's mortal part ! 
See, thou art mangling on thy cruel wheel 
Faridun's fingers, and Kai Khosrau's heart! 

ccxLvn 
From this world's kitchen toil not to obtain 
Those dainties, seeming real, but really vain, 

Which greedy worldlings gorge to their own loss ; 
Renounce that loss, so loss shall prove thy gain! 

217 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



ccxlvhi 
Ah ! would there were a place of rest from pain, 
Which we, poor pilgrims, might at last attain, 

And after many thousand wintry years, 
Renew our life, like flowers, and bloom again ! 

CCXLIX 

Winter is past, and spring-tide has begun, 
Soon will the pages of life's book be done ! 

Well saith the sage, " Life is a poison rank, 
And antidote, save grape-juice, there is none." 



CCL 

Last night I dashed my cup against a stone, 
In a mad drunken freak, as I must own, 

And lo ! the cup cried out in agony, 
" You too, like me, shall soon be overthrown." 



CCLI 

Open the door ! O entrance who procurest, 

And guide the way, O Thou of guides the surest ! 

Directors born of men shall not direct me, 
Their counsel comes to naught, but Thou endurest! 

218 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CCLII 

Give me a skin of wine, a crust of bread, 
A pittance bare, a book of verse to read; 

With thee, O love, to share my lowly roof, 
I would not take the Sultan's realm instead! 



CCLIII 

Behold, where'er we turn our ravished eyes, 
Sweet verdure springs, and crystal Kausars rise ; 

And plains, once bare as hell, now smile as heaven: 
Enjoy this heaven with maids of Paradise! 



CCLIV 

When dawn doth silver the dark firmament, 
Why shrills the bird of dawning his lament? 
It is to show in dawn's bright looking-glass 
How of thy careless life a night is spent. 



CCLV 

Cupbearer, come ! from thy full-throated ewer 
Pour blood-red wine, the world's despite to cure! 

Where can I find another friend like wine, 
So genuine, so solacing, so pure? 

219 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CCLVI 

It chanced into a potter's shop I strayed, 

He turned his wheel and deftly plied his trade, 

And out of monarchs' heads, and beggars' feet, 
Fair heads and handles for his pitchers made! 



CCLVII 

Who framed the lots of quick and dead but Thou? 
Who turns the troublous wheel of heaven but Thou; 

Though we are sinful slaves, is it for Thee 
To blame us? Who created us but Thou? 



CCLVIII 

A Shaikh beheld a harlot, and quoth he, 
" You seem a slave to drink and lechery ; " 

And she made answer, " What I seem I am, 
But, Master, are you all you seem to be?" 



CCLIX 

If, like a ball, earth to my house were borne, 
When drunk, I 'd rate it at a barley-corn ; 

Last night they offered me in pawn for wine, 
But the rude vintner laughed that pledge to scorn. 

220 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CCLX 

Now in thick clouds Thy face Thou dost immerse, 
And now display it in this universe; 

Thou the spectator, Thou the spectacle, 
Sole to Thyself Thy glories dost rehearse. 



CCLXI 

Better to make one soul rejoice with glee, 
Than plant a desert with a colony; 

Rather one freeman bind with chains of love, 
Than set a thousand prisoned captives free ! 

CCLXII 

Wherever you can get two maunds of wine, 
Set to, and drink it like a libertine ; 

Whoso acts thus will set his spirit free 
From saintly airs like yours, and grief like mine. 



CCLXIII 

Yes ! here am I with wine and feres again ! 
I did repent, but ah ! 't was all in vain ; 

Preach not to me of Noah and his flood, 
But pour a flood of wine to drown my pain ! 

221 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



cclxiv 
Angel of joyful foot! the dawn is nigh; 
Pour wine, and lift thy tuneful voice on high, 

Sing how Jamsheds and Khosraus bit the dust, 
Whelmed by the rolling months, from Tir to Dai ! 

CCLXV 

Oh that great Allah would rebuild these skies, 
And earth, and that at once, before my eyes, 
And either rase my name from off his roll, 
Or else relieve my dire necessities ! 

CCLXVI 

Ah ! brand, ah burning brand, foredoomed to burn 
In fires of dread Gehennom in thy turn, 
Presume not to teach Allah clemency, 
For who art thou to teach, or he to learn? 



CCLXVII 

I never would have come, had I been asked, 
I would as lief not go, if I were asked, 

And, to be short, I would annihilate 
All coming, being, going, were I asked ! 

222 



WHINFIELD VERSION 



CCLXVIII 

A potter at his work I chanced to see, 
Pounding some earth and shreds of pottery ; 

I looked with eyes of insight, and methought 
'Twas Adam's dust with which he made so free! 



CCLXIX 

No longer hug your grief and vain despair, 
But in this unjust world be just and fair ; 

And since the substance of the world is naught, 
Think you are naught, and so shake off dull care ! 



223 



APPENDIX 

COMPARATIVE STANZAS 
of the FITZGERALD, MCCARTHY 
AND WHINFIELD VERSIONS 

Also A BIBLIOGRAPHY of the 

Foreign and English Translations 



15 225 



COMPARATIVE STANZAS 

of/kFlTzGERALD, MCCARTHY 
AND WHINFIELD VERSIONS 



cxin 
Ixix 



lxxii 



FitzGerald McCarthy Whinfield 

i Wake ! For the Sun, who scatter'd into 

flight 

ii Before the phantom of False morning 

died, . clxxxiii 

iii And, as the Cock crew, those who stood 

before ccccxix 

iv Now the New Year reviving old Desires . xci 

v Iram indeed is gone with all his Rose, . . 
vi And David's lips are lockt ; but in divine . ccxlvii 
vii Come, fill the Cup, and in the fire of 

Spring clxvii 

viii Whether at Naishapur or Babylon, . . . cxlviii 
ix Each Morn a thousand Roses brings, you 

say; cccclxiii 

x Well, let it take them! What have we 

to do cccxc 

xi With me along the strip of Herbage 

strown clxxvii 

xii A Book of Verses underneath the Bough i cccxcvlu 

(ccccxlix 

xiii Some for the Glories of This World ; and 

~~~ a (cclxvii 

some < 

(cccxiv 
xiv Look to the blowing Rose about us — 

"Lo," cciv 

xv And those who husbanded the Golden 

grain, cclxxvii xciv 

xvi The Worldly Hope men set their Hearts 

upon cxxxvi 

xvii Think, in this batter'd Caravanserai . . cxl xli 

xviii They say the Lion and the Lizard keep . cli xlii 

xix I sometimes think that never blows so 

red „ . . . lix 

227 



xlvii 
cclii 

lxii 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



FitzGerald McCarthy 

xx And this reviving Herb whose tender 

Green cxxiii 

xxi Ah, my Beloved, fill the Cup that clears cxciv 
xxii For some we loved, the loveliest and the 

best 

xxiii And we, that now make merry in the 

Room clvi 

xxiv Ah, make the most of what we yet may 

spend, ccclviii 

xxv Alike for those who for TO- DAY prepare ccccxxxiv 
xxvi Why, all the Saints and Sages who dis- 

cuss'd cclii 

xxvii Myself when young did eagerly frequent xl 
xxviii With them the seed of Wisdom did I 

sow 

xxix Into this Universe, and Why not know- 
ing li 

xxx What, without asking, hither hurried 

Whence ? clxxxviii 

xxxi Up from Earth's Centre through the 

Seventh Gate 

xxxii There was the Door to which I found no 

Key; ii 

xxxiii Earth could not answer ; nor the Seas 

that mourn 

xxxiv Then of the THEE IN ME who works be- 
hind ccxxvi 

xxxv Then to the lip of this poor earthen 

Urn cccxlv 

xxxvi I think the Vessel, that with fugitive . lxxiii 
xxxvii For I remember stopping by the way . ccxlv 
xxxviii And has not such a Story from of Old . cclxx 
xxxix And not a drop that from our Cups we 

throw clxx 

228 



Whinfield 

xxxvii 
clxxv 

cxxxii 
cxxvii 

xliii 

ccxxiii 
ccxvi 

lxxix 
ccxlii 
cxlvi 



lxiv 
Ixxviii 

clxviii 



cxxxvin 

clii 
xx 
cxli 
cclxviii 

cxiv 



COMPARATIVE STANZAS 



FitzGerald McCarthy Whinfield 

xl As then the Tulip for her morning sup . cii 
xli Perplext no more with Human or^ xiv 

Divine jlxxvii cxc 

\CClxxxni 
xlii And if the Wine you drink, the Lip you 

press, lxxxv 1 

xliii So when that Angel of the darker 

Drink cxlii 

xliv Why, if the Soul can fling the Dust 

aside, cccclxix ccxlv 

xlv 'Tis but a Tent where takes his one 

day's rest clxix xlv 

xlvi And fear not lest Existence closing 

your ccxxxv lxxxvii 

xlvii When You and I behind the Veil are 

past, ccx 

xlviii A Moment's Halt — a momentary 

taste clxv lxxiii 

xlix Would you that spangle of Existence 

spend xlvi xiii 

1 A Hair perhaps divides the False and 

True; xiii 

li Whose secret Presence, through Crea- 
tion's veins 

lii A moment guess'd — then back behind 

the Fold cccxlvi cclx 

liii But if in vain, down on the stubborn 

floor lxix xxxi 

liv Waste not your Hour, nor in the vain 

pursuit (cclxxvi_ xdx 

'cccxxvin 
Iv You know, my Friends, with what a 

brave Carouse xx ex 

lvi For "IS" and " Is-NOT " though with 

Rule and Line eclxxvi xcix 

1 See Variants of Stanza xlii for closer parallels. 

22g 



RUBAIYAt OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



FitzGerald McCarthy Whinfield 

lvii Ah, but my Computations, People say . xvii 
lviii And lately, by the Tavern Door agape, . ccclx 
lix The Grape that can with Logic absolute . cclxxxix cviii 
lx The mighty Mahmud, Allah-breathing 

Lord, 

lxi Why, be this Juice the growth of God, 

who dare " lxxxiv cxlvii 

lxii I must abjure the Balm of Life, I must . cclxvii 
lxiii Oh threats of Hell and Hopes of Para- 
dise ! lxi 

lxiv Strange, is it not? that of the myriads, Jxxxi cxliy 

who iclx cxlviii 

lxv The Revelations of Devout and Learn'd . cxx 

lxvi I sent my Soul through the Invisible, . lxvii 

lxvii Heav'n but the Vision of fulfill'd Desire, . xcviii li 

lxviii We are no other than a moving row . . ccxxx clxxiii 
lxix But helpless Pieces of the Game He 

plays lxi cli 

lxx The Ball no question makes of Ayes 

and Noes, ccxxx 

lxxi The Moving Finger writes ; and, having, ,. .... 

writ ' ilxxxvi xxiii 

lxxii And that inverted Bowl they call tne ( . jj v 

y ' ; " ' ' (ccccxxxviii ccxxxiii 

lxxiii With Earth's first Clay They did the 

Last Man knead, lxxxvi xxiii 

lxxiv Yesterday This Day's Madness did 

prepare ; clxxx xlviii 

lxxv I tell you this — When, started from the 

Goal, ccxix lxxvi 

lxxvi The Vine had struck a fibre : which 

about 

lxxvii And this I know : whether the one True 

Light lxxxvii cxlv 

230 



COMPARATIVE STANZAS 



FitzGerald McCarthy 
Ixxviii What ! out of senseless Nothing to pro- 
voke cxii 

lxxix What! from His helpless Creature be 

repaid clxxxix 

lxxx Oh Thou, who didst with pitfall and 

with gin ccxcvi 

lxxxi Oh Thou, who Man of baser Earth 

didst make, 

lxxxii As under cover of departing Day . . . cccxciii 

lxxxiii Shapes of all Sorts and Sizes, great, 

* „ s fcxv 

and small, •) 

(. cccxciii 
lxxxiv Said one among them — " Surely not in 

vain " ccclxiii 

Ixxxv Then said a second — " Ne'er a peevish 

Boy" . . c 

lxxxvi After a momentary silence spake . . . cccxliv 
Ixxxvii Whereat some one of the loquacious 

Lot — cxv 

lxxxviii " Why," said another, " Some there are 

who tell" cclxxxi 

lxxxix " Well," murmur'd one, " Let whoso 

make or buy," cxxv 

xc So while the Vessels one by one were 

speaking 

xci Ah, with the Grape my fading Life, ... 

provide, vm 

xcii That ev'n my buried Ashes such a ° 1V 

snare xxvii 

xciii Indeed the Idols I have loved so long . cclxxxvii 

xciv Indeed, indeed, Repentance oft before .| c ^ lv 
xcv And much as Wine has play'd the X " 

Infidel, 

xcvi Yet Ah, that Spring should vanish with 

the Rose ! ccxxiii 

23I 



Whinfield 
lvi 

ccxliii 

cclvi 
cclvi 



xxiv 

cclvii 

lxxi 

clvii 



clxxxviii 



IV 

Ixxv 



x 
lxxxviii 



cxxn 



lxxxiii 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



FitzGerald McCarthy Whinfield 

xcvii Would but the Desert of the Fountain 

yield ccccxl ccxlviii 

xcviii Would but some wing6d Angel ere too 

late ccccxlviii cclxv 

xcix Ah Love ! could you and I with Him 

conspire ccclxxviii ccxvii 

c Yon rising Moon that looks for us,. 



a S ain ~ 'Ixlvii 

ci And when like her, oh Saki, you shall , 

' ' J . { CXVl 

pass civ < 

r » CXXXl 



232 



BIBLIOGRAPHY of the 

RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 

FOREIGN TRANSLATIONS. 

Thomas Hyde, D.D. " Veterum Persarum et Parthorum et 
Medorum Religionis Historia." Oxford. 1700. Contains one Latin 
quatrain. 

J. Von Hammer- Purgstall. " Geschichte der schonen Redekunste 
Persiens." Vienna. 1818. 25 quatrains. 

Garcin de Tassy. " Note sur les Ruba'iyat de' Omar Khaiyam." 
Paris. 1857. 10 quatrains in prose. 

J. B. Nicolas. " Les Quatrains de Kheyam, Traduits du Persan." 
Paris. 1867. 464 quatrains, with notes. 

Be"la Harrach. " Keleti Gyongybk, Egy Cynikus Persa Kolto, 
Omer Chejjam." 1 Budapest. No date. 130 pp. Follows order of 
Nicolas. 

Adolph Friedrich Grafen von Schack. " Strophen des Omar Chi- 
jam." Stuttgart. 1878. 336 quatrains. 

Friedrich Bodenstedt. " Die Lieder und Spriiche des Omar 
Chajjam." Breslau. 1881. 467 quatrains. 

Italo Pizzi. " Storia della Poesia Persiana." Turin. 1894. 63 
quatrains. 

Vittorio Rugarli. "Omar Khayyam. Dieci Quartine, Tradotte 
dal Persiano." Bologna. 1895. 

Vittorio Rugarli. " Dodici Quartine, Omar Khayyam. Tradotte dal 
Persiano." Bologna. 1895. 12 quatrains, translated from Nicolas. 

Herbert Wilson Greene, M.A., B.C.L. Rubaiyat of Omar Khay- 
yam. Translated into Latin Verse. Oxford. 1893. Privately 
printed by Nathan Haskell Dole. Boston. 1898. 



1 Eastern Pearls, by the Persian Cynic poet, Omar Khayyam. 

233 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS. 

EDWARD FITZGERALD'S VERSIONS. 
FIRST EDITION. 

RubSiyat || of || Omar Khayyam, || the Astronomer-Poet of Persia. || 
Translated into English Verse. || London: || Bernard Quaritch, || 
Castle Street, Leicester Square. || 1859. 

On the verso : G. Norman, Printer, Maiden Lane, Covent Garden, 
London. 

Small quarto. Brown paper wrappers. 75 quatrains. 22 notes. 

The Same, privately reprinted at Madras, 1862, together with a note 
by Garcin de Tassy and an article by Prof. E. B. Cowell, with a few 
additional quatrains. 

The Same, a type fac-simile of the first edition, privately printed by 
Thomas J. Wise in the Ashley Library Series. London. 1887. 

Quarto. 25 copies on Dutch paper and 4 on vellum. 

SECOND EDITION. 

Rubaiyat || of || Omar Khayyam, || the Astronomer-Poet of Persia. 
|| Rendered into English Verse. || Second Edition. || London : || 
Bernard Quaritch, || Piccadilly. || 1868. 

(John Childs and Sons, Printers.) Quarto. Paper wrappers, 
no quatrains. 25 notes. 

THIRD EDITION. 

Rubaiyat || of || Omar Khayyam, || the Astronomer-Poet of Persia, 
|| Rendered into English Verse. || Third Edition. || London : || Ber- 
nard Quaritch, || Piccadilly. || 1872. 

Quarto, half Roxburghe, maroon cloth. 101 quatrains. 

FOURTH EDITION. 

Rubaiyat || of || Omar Khayyam || and the Salaman and Absal || of || 
J ami; || Rendered into English Verse || Bernard Quaritch ; 15 Picca- 
dilly, London, 1879. 

Fcap. 4to, half Roxburghe. 101 quatrains. 

234 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



FIFTH EDITION. 

Letters || and || Literary Remains || of || Edward FitzGerald || Edited 
by || William Aldis Wright || in Three Volumes. || London : || Mac- 
millan and Co. || and New York. || i88g. All Rights reserved. 

Crown 8vo. Text in volume 3. 101 quatrains. 

The Same, reprinted separately, London : Macmillan and Co., and 
New York. 1890. Fifth Edition with variations of the preceding 
editions. 

PIRATED EDITION. 

Omar Khayyam. The Rubaiyat Translated into English Verse. 
London. John Campbell, Jun. 1883. 

(Printed for Henry Quilter and his friends. The first leaf bears 
the inscription : " To the Translator, with the Printer's thanks and 
apologies.") 

ASHENDENE EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam of Naishapur, the Astronomer-Poet 
of Persia. Rendered into English Verse. C. H. St. John Hornby. 
Ashendene Press, 1896. 

Small quarto. 50 copies for private circulation only. 

MACDOUGALL EDITION. 

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, the Astronomer-Poet of Persia. 
Rendered into English Verse by Edward FitzGerald. Decorated by 
W. B. Macdougall. London : Macmillan and Co. Ltd. New York : 
The Macmillan Co. 1898. 

Quarto. Text of First Edition without translators Introduction 
or Notes. Border decorations by Octave Lacour. Edition de luxe, 
limited to 1000 copies. 

GOLDEN TREASURY EDITION. 

Text of the Fifth Edition. London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 
New York: The Macmillan Co. i8gg. 
Sq. i6mo. 

235 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



FOUR-TEXT EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, the Astronomer- Poet of Persia. 
Rendered into English Verse by Edward FitzGerald. Texts of the 
Four Editions with the Original Prefaces and Notes. London : 
Macmillan and Co. 1899. 

Extra Crown 8vo. Vellum bds. 



AMERICAN EDITIONS OF FITZGERALD'S 
TRANSLATION. 

FIRST AMERICAN. 

Rubaiyat || of || Omar Khayyam, || the Astronomer-Poet of Persia. 
|| Rendered into English Verse. || First American || From the Third 
London Edition || Boston: || James R. Osgood and Company, || Late 
Ticknor & Fields, and Fields, Osgood & Company. || 1878. 

Sq. i6mo. 

(The 26th Edition, Houghton, Mifflin & Co. 1896.) 

VEDDER EDITION. 

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, the Astronomer-Poet of Persia. 
Rendered into English Verse by Edward FitzGerald, with an 
Accompaniment of Drawings by Elihu Vedder. Houghton, Mifflin 
& Co. Boston. 1884. 

The Same, Edition de luxe, 1884. 

The Same, Phototype Edition, reduced plates. 1886. 

The Same, Popular Edition, with introduction by M. K. 1894. 

GROLIER CLUB EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, the Astronomer-Poet of Persia. 
Rendered into English Verse by Edward FitzGerald. The Grolier 
Club of New York. 1885. Reprinted From the Edition of Bernard 
Quaritch, London, 1879. 

Medium 8vo. 150 copies on Japan paper. 2 on Vellum. 

236 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



MEMORIAL EDITION. 

Works of Edward FitzGerald, Translator of Omar Khayyam, Re- 
printed From the Original Impressions, with some corrections 
derived from his own annotated copies. In two volumes. New York 
and Boston : Houghton, Mifflin & Co. London : Bernard Quaritch. 
1887. 

8vo. A few large paper copies, royal 8vo. 

COMPARATIVE EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of First and Fourth editions, with introduction and 
notes by M. K. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co. 1888. 

SAN FRANCISCO EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. San Francisco 1891. 
i2mo, pamphlet, green paper wrappers. 

STODDARD PRIVATE EDITION. 

Selections From The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Privately 
printed for John L. Stoddard, Boston, 1893. 
100 copies, 8vo. 

MOSHER BIBELOT EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, Printed for Thomas B. Mosher and 
published by Him, Portland, Maine, 1894. 

Narrow Fcap. 8vo. 725 copies on Van Gelder paper and 25 copies 
on Japan vellum. (Out of print.) 

MOSHER OLD WORLD EDITION. 

Text of First, Second, and Fourth Editions, with sonnet by 
Rosamund Mariott Watson ; toast by Theodore Watts ; biography 
of FitzGerald by W. Irving Way, etc. 

Narrow Fcap. 8vo. 925 copies; 100 on Japan vellum, 1895. 

BRADLEY EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, Published for Will Bradley by R. H. 
Russell, New York, 1896. 
Sq. i2mo, bds. 



237 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



ST. PAUL EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, Printed for E. W. Porter Co., St. 
Paul, Minn. 1895. 

Sq. i2mo, bds. 750 numbered copies on hand-made paper. 

The Same, on imitation hand-made paper. 1897. 

CROWELL EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam and the Salaman and Absal of J ami, 
Rendered into English Verse by Edward FitzGerald. New York and 
Boston. 1896. 

Sq. i2mo. Text of First and Fifth editions, with variations and 
notes. 

VARIORUM EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, English, French and German trans- 
lations, comparatively arranged in accordance with the text of 
Edward FitzGerald's version. With biographies, bibliography, 
etc. Edited by Nathan Haskell Dole. In Two Volumes. Joseph 
Knight and Co. Boston. 1896. 

MULTI-VARIORUM EDITION. 

The Same, with Italian and Dutch translations added ; and with 
fuller annotations, bibliography, etc. Two volumes L. C. Page and 
Co., Boston. 1897. 

DODGE EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. San Francisco. 1896. 

Sq. i2mo. Paper wrappers. 

Same. De luxe edition. 

Same* New edition, 1898. 

Same. With poem by Edmund Gosse and Side-lights by Edw. 
Heron-Allen. New York, i8gg. 

Sq. i6mo. 

COATES EDITION. 

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, Edited by Talcott Williams, 
Philadelphia. H. T. Coates & Co. 1898. 

Sq. i2mo. 

238 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



"LARK CLASSICS" EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, First and Fourth Editions. Wm. 
Doxey. At the Sign of the Lark. San Francisco. 1898. 

Sq. i6mo. 

ROBERTSON PAMPHLET EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. San Francisco. 1898. 
Fcap. quarto. 

THE THREE-TEXT EDITION. 

First, Second and Fifth Editions Edited by Nathan Haskell Dole. 
Illustrated by Gilbert James and Edmund H. Garrett. Boston, L. C. 
Page & Co. 1898. 

i2mo, cloth. 

THE McMANUS EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Being a Reprint of FitzGerald's 
Fourth English Translation. With page decorations from original 
designs by Blanche McManus. 

Introduction and Notes omitted. New York, 1898. 

Fcap. 4to, bds. 

DEPARTMENT STORE EDITION. 

Text of the Fourth Edition, without Introduction or Notes. Bos- 
ton, 1898. 

Sq. i6mo, cloth. 

ROYCROFT EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam: Being the FitzGerald Version of 
1879. The Roycroft Shop, East Aurora, New York, 1898. 

Nine hundred and ten copies hand illumined, with a few additional 
copies specially illumined. 

THE TRUTH SEEKER EDITION. 

Text of Fourth Edition, with foot-notes and an original intro- 
duction. New York, 1898. 
Sq. i2mo. Pamphlet. 

239 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



CRITIC EDITION. 

Reprint of text of the Fourth Edition, from the Critic of Decem- 
ber, 1898. New York, 1898. 

Sq. i6mo. Pamphlet. 

LOS ANGELES EDITION. 

Edward Fitz Gerald's Omar Khayyam with a Prose Translation 
from the French of J. B. Nicolas, and an Introduction by James B. 
Scott. Los Angeles, C. C. Parker, 1899. 

Text of Fourth Edition. Narrow i6mo, paper bds. 500 copies. 

VEST POCKET EDITION. 

Edward FitzGerald. Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam with Preface 
(and a Pronouncing Vocabulary) by Nathan Haskell Dole. Portland, 
Maine. Thomas B. Mosher, 1899. 

Narrow i6mo. 

PRIVATELY PRINTED EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of || Omar Khayyam || Portland, Maine. || Privately 
Printed || 1899. 

Quarto. Unpaged. Full vellum. Silk ties. 

Text of the Fourth, with minor variants of the Fifth edition. 
T. B. M. & E. B. G. Portland, Maine. May, 1899. 

" Ten copies and no more, printed on pure vellum." 

MANSFIELD EDITION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Text of Fourth Edition, with an 
Address by Hon. H. H. Asquith. New York, Mansfield. 1899. 

32mo. Leather. 500 copies. 
THE " VADEMECUM " EDITION. 

Text of Fourth Edition without FitzGerald's name. Philadelphia, 
Altemus. (1899.) 
i6mo, cloth. 

" MASTERPIECES" EDITION. 

Text of Fourth Edition, with half-tone illustrations by George 
Tobin. F. A. Stokes & Co., New York. {1899.) 

i8mo, red cloth. 

240 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



GROSSET EDITION. 

Text of Fourth Edition, New York. A. Grosset & Co. (i8gg.) 
Narrow 121110. Green wrapper and envelope. 

The Same, i2mo, cloth, with decorative borders by C. D. Farrand 
and half-tone illustrations by Gilbert James. 1899. 

BROWN EDITION. 

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Rendered into English Verse 
by Edward FitzGerald. Edited with an Introduction and Notes by 
"William Augustus Brown. Edition de luxe, limited to 300 copies. 
Boston : Houghton, Mifflin and Co. 1900. Text of the Second Edi- 
tion, with additional quatrains from the First Edition, and variants 
of the Third and Fourth. 



LATER ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS. 
E. H. WHINFIELD. 

Quatrains of Omar Khayyam, Translated Into English Verse by 
E. H. Whinfield, M.A. Late of the Bengal Civil Service. London: 
Triibner and Co. 1882. 

8vo. 253 quatrains. 

Second Edition: Persian Text with English Verse Translation. 
1883. 

8vo. 500 quatrains. 

Third Edition [Second Edition revised], 1893. 267 quatrains. 
P. WHALLEY. 

Nine " Metrical Translations from the Quatrains of Umar Khay- 
yam " by P. Whalley, C.S. Muradabad. The Journal of the Asiatic 
Society of Bengal. 1877. 

WHITELY STOKES. 

Eighteen Quatrains from Omar Khayyam. " The Academy," Jan. 
17, 1885. 

16 241 



RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM 



H. G. KEENE. 

Stanzas From Omar Khayyam, Rendered Into English Verse by 
H. G. Keene. " Macmillan's Magazine," November, 1887. 

ANONYMOUS VERSION. 

The Dialogue || of || the Gulshan-i-Raz || or Mystical Garden of 
Roses of || Mahmoud Shabistari || With Selections from || The 
Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. London : Trubner & Co., Ludgate 
Hill. || 1887. 

8vo. Includes 22 Rubaiyat. 

LOUISA S. COSTELLO 

The Rose Garden of Persia, by Louisa Stuart Costello. London : 
George Bell and Sons. 1887. 66-76 pp. devoted to Omar Khayyam, 
with paraphrases from his work. 

MICHAEL KERNEY 

Translation in the original metre of fifty of the Rubaiyat of 
Omar Khayyam. 

Included in the Houghton, Mifflin & Co. edition of 1888. Edited 
by M. K. 
JOHN LESLIE GARNER 

The Strophes of Omar Khayyam, Translated by John Leslie 
Garner. With an Introduction and Notes. Milwaukee : The Corbitt 
and Skidmore Co. 1888. 

Sq. i2mo. 142 quatrains. 

Second Edition, Henry T. Coates & Co. Philadelphia. i8g8. 

The Same: George Bell and Sons, London. 1898. 

MCCARTHY'S PROSE VERSION. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, Translated by Justin Huntly 
McCarthy, M.P. Published by David Nutt, in the Strand. 1889. 

Fcap. bds. 

MOSHER REPRINT. 

The Same, Thomas B. Mosher, Portland, Maine. 1896. 
The Same, revised edition, London, 1898. i2mo, cloth. 

242 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



RICHARD LE GALLIENNE PARAPHRASE. 

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, A Paraphrase From Several Literal 
Translations, by Richard Le Gallienne. London : Grant Richards, 
1897. 

Narrow 8vo. 

The Same. New York: John Lane, 1897. Octavo, bds. 1250 copies 
numbered and signed by the author ; also 50 copies on Japan vellum. 
Selections from this paraphrase were published in the Cosmopol- 
itan (New York), for July and August, 1897. 

F. YORK POWELL. 

Twenty-four Quatrains from Omar. Printed in the " Pageant," 
London, 1897. 
Octavo, cloth. Pp. 106-108. 

JOHN PAYNE. 

The Quatrains of Omar Khayyam, the Astronomer-Poet of Persia, 
Now first completely done into English verse in the original forms. 
(845 quatrains). The Villon Society, London, 1898. 

Octavo, vellum. 675 numbered copies on hand-made paper, and 
75 large paper copies. 

EDWARD HERON-ALLEN. 

The II Rubaiyat || of || Omar Khayyam || Being a Facsimile of the 
Manuscript in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, || with a transcript 
into modern Persian characters, || and a bibliography, || by Edward 
Heron-Allen. || London, || H. S. Nichols, Ltd. 1898. 

Royal octavo. White leather. 

1000 small paper copies, 20 large paper copies, and 2 copies on 
vellum. 

The Same, including Some Side-lights upon Edward Fitz Gerald's 
Poem. 

Second edition, revised and enlarged. Boston: L. C. Page & Co. 
1893. 

Royal octavo. White leather. 

The Same, with Introduction by Nathan Haskell Dole. London 
and Boston : H. S. Nichols, Ltd. 1898. 

243 



rubXiyAt of omar khayyAm 



JESSIE E. CADELL. 

The Ruba'yat of Omar Kha'yam ; A New Translation in Verse. 
With an Introduction by Richard Garnett. London and New York : 
John Lane, 1899. 

i2mo, cloth. 

ELIZABETH ALDEN CURTIS. 

One Hundred Quatrains From the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. 
A Rendering in English Verse by Elizabeth Alden Curtis. With an 
Introduction by Richard Burton. Gouverneur, New York. Brothers 
of the Book. 1899. 

i2mo. 600 copies on hand-made paper. 

CHARLES PEREZ MURPHY. 

49 Stanzas paraphrased from Mrs. CadelPs version. " National 
Magazine," Boston, Dec, 1899. 



244 



